The Job Search and Why It's Bad Right Now

The job hunt. Whilst millions of people in the world are lucky to have a job right now, there are millions of people right now that are out of a job, and millions of people who are in a job, but see no future in their current role. So, why is it so hard to find a job right now in this day and age? It seemed like just ten years ago in 2016, finding a job after school whilst in college or even after university, the job hunt didn't seem so draining or difficult, and it did seem much easier to find a job back then. But now, you're lucky to even find a job that doesn't require multiple years of experience, a masters or bachelors degree, or even one that won't consider getting back to you. So today, I want to write and share why finding a job is much harder and rare now than what it was years ago.

One of the first reasons for finding a job at this time are two things that can go hand in hand due to a lot of jobs having the overlaps of both of them. And that is the fact that a lot of jobs require people to have multiple years of experience in a certain field or a masters/bachelors degree in a certain field, with the odd jobs requiring both. This means that a lot of people who are out of employment find it much harder to get a job. This is mostly due to the fact that things like university are expensive or people who are wanting the experience won't be able to get that experience mostly because of the lack of jobs that are willing people to get that experience. I do want to talk about both in a bit more detail though.

I'm going to start with the degree part of the two. Whilst I understand that a lot of jobs do require a degree, such as doctors, nurses, law, teachers, vets, dentists or even microbiologists, there are jobs out there that, despite just needing experience and a strong portfolio, still requires a degree. Take journalism for example. Whilst a degree isn't needed, just an online presence, a lot of experience and a well put together portfolio, a degree in journalism is beneficial mostly because it is much harder without that degree to get a job in journalism due to employers liking the fact you have a degree, along with the strong portfolio. Take me for example, I am having to go to university for a bachelors/honours degree in journalism due to the job market surrounding journalism being difficult if you don't have a degree.

Now I am going to talk about the experience part of this. The second reason why people find it much harder to find a job right now is the rising jobs in the market seeking people with many years of experience. Like the degree one, I understand in some situations where you're needed to have a lot of years in a certain field, people are feeling defeated mostly because they can't get the experience they need due to not being able to find it. Now, entry level jobs seem to require at least 3 to 5 years of experience. Which, if you think, how are you supposed to gain experience for future endeavours, if jobs require you to have 5+ years of experience? Again, whilst I understand that certain roles in certain jobs need many years of experience, especially managerial roles, senior roles, assistant manager roles and more, why are a lot of jobs requiring people to have many years of experience just for a simple entry level role? This means people who may have a degree in something may not be able to get a job they want because they lack the experience that entry level roles were supposed to provide since the roles were designed for people with little to no experience and to be trained up.

The next thing I want to talk about is the rise of AI. This is another thing that is a big thing on why people are struggling to find a job right now. Unfortunately, with the rise of AI, the job market has been a main thing that has been negatively targeted. With AI taking over jobs, mainly the creative jobs, but it's also jobs like administration, logistics, technology, marketing and more. But also, with companies implementing AI into their software, it shows that to them, it doesn't cost them anything because they don't need to pay AI for the work. It also shows that companies are willing to cut corners to have AI since it's easier to train an AI than a human. However, from my own personal experience, I have noticed a lot of jobs, such as journalism and social media managers are more likely to be AI due to easy prompts the company can give. This means that whilst companies are wanting to hire people to be training their AI models, it is directly taking away jobs from writers, photographers, data entry keepers, computer programmers, social media managers, editors, designers and many more creative and tech savvy jobs that humans are able to do as they are able to put more effort into their work. However, this means, with how fast AI, especially generative AI has developed overtime in recent years, it has a tendency for inaccuracies and misleading information.

For example, whilst the Google AI is a quicker way to get information, it has been known to give false information, and this means less people are going to different websites to find their sources and correct facts. AI is also known to steal from people's creative work. So any photographs, drawings, edits, videos, writing, or even in the tech field, data and work from so many people are being stolen for the AI algorithm to create their final work. This means, a lot of the time, people are unsure about the work created being AI or not. However, this means that the AI that companies use, ultimately jobs are becoming sparse for people, especially those who are trying to get their foot in the door for bigger things, such as gaining relevant experience or climbing the ladder to achieve higher things.

Another thing I want to talk about in terms of the job search are the ghost jobs. These jobs are designed to be posted on popular sites such as Indeed or Linkedin, but in the end, after putting in an application, you don't hear a response from the employer for months on end. These are ghost jobs. These are jobs that are designed to give you hope, but in the end, that hope will be ripped away from you since you're not supposed to get a response from them. This means finding a job, especially a job that's supposed to be an entry level job or something to get experience in, you can't get because you don't get a response for the job that was listed. This means that people are getting more and more defeated and are slowly losing the will to find a job, leading more and more people to not be in jobs because there are companies that are putting out false job listings, which people are applying to, but not getting a response from. This means, people are applying to hundreds, even thousands of jobs, but only getting very few responses, which a lot of the responses are rejection emails. This means that finding any relevant experience is very rare and just being able to apply for a job and also getting a response is also very rare. In the end, a lot of people between the ages of 16 and their early 20's are getting asked why we're in jobs we hate or not in a job, and a lot of the reasons why I explained are some of the main reasons on why people are struggling to get a job right now. But you also have to remember that people with disabilities exist too, so a lot of the time, people with debilitating disabilities struggle to work as well.

The final thing I want to talk about in terms of the job search being so bad now is the other requirements that are needed for a job, mostly distance. I'm not talking about remote jobs where travel isn't really necessary, unless you're in a hybrid based job close to your home town, I'm talking about the jobs where you would need to catch a minimum of two buses or two different modes of transportation. Or when you're looking for a job in your home town or in the surrounding areas (where you would only really need to catch one bus, tram or train), they show you jobs further out from where you would realistically like to work. For example, I have found jobs nowhere near where I live or jobs that just state "United Kingdom", all because the sites I look on don't think to find jobs close to where I want to find jobs.

I think right now all the job market does is cater to those who do have degrees or many years of experience or who are willing to train AI models. I also think that right now, a lot of jobs aren't for those trying to get into a creative or tech based job, like previously mentioned, due to the training of AI models, along with seemingly the lack of jobs in general. This means that people are increasingly becoming more and more frustrated in not being able to be in a job or find one that would suit them in the long run to not only work around their schedule to some degree, but also the lack of jobs that don't require you to spend so much money just having to travel hours away for a job. Not to mention that the pay can be awful as well since I have seen stories on how there are some people working two plus jobs, living with their partner who is also working two plus jobs and are still barely able to make ends meet. These are some reasons why young people are finding it difficult to find a job. It's not that we aren't trying. It's for the fact that it has become so much harder to find one in this economy. Years ago, you could go to college, go to university, and land a job within a month max. But now, you go to college, go to university, and you're lucky to get a job with the degree you have. Which means a lot of people today are either out of a job for reasons that may be the job search in general or disability related, or they're in a job they don't like that wasn't in line with their degree because it was the only thing that they could find and where the employer had got back to them, interviewed and hired them for the role.