Jobless Find It Harder To Get New Work

More time is spent seeking a position, with the pain mostly in white-collar sectors

- BY MATT GROSSMAN AND JASMINE LI

The U.S. economy has added more than two million jobs over the past year. But more people who are out of work are having a hard time getting back in.

As of November, more than seven million Americans were unemployed, meaning they didn't have work and were trying to find it. More than 1.6 million of those jobless workers had been job hunting for at least six months, according to the Labor Department. The number of people searching for that long is up more than 50% since the end of 2022.

On average, it now takes people about six months to find a job, about a month longer than it did during the postpandemic hiring boom in early 2023, according to the Labor Department. The pain is largely in high-paying white-collar jobs, including in tech, law and media, where businesses grew fast when the economy reopened from the pandemic but now have less need for new hires.

A labor market that looks healthy in the headlines is, under the surface, weaker than it seems. The unemployment rate, at 4.2%, remains well below the average during the decade before the pandemic. But there is now just about one job posting per unemployed worker, down from two in early 2022. Strong hiring has narrowed to a thin set of industries. The government's monthly jobs report on Friday will provide another snapshot of the market's health.

"My life is on complete pause," said Olivia Palak, who was laid off in May after three months at a new company.