Washington —
Muneeb Iqbal is set to graduate with a master’s degree in integrated design, business and technology from the University of Southern California next month, but he doesn’t have a job or internship lined up, despite the 4,000 applications he’s tallied over the past year.
The 23-year-old told CNN he’s noticed on LinkedIn that many of the entry-level roles he’s applied for have gone to people with several years of experience. Since beginning graduate school in 2024, Iqbal has managed to complete only one internship, he said — all while racking up $100,000 in student debt.
US job growth has slowed sharply over the past year, making it especially difficult for young Americans not just to land their first jobs out of college but even to land internships, often the foundational step in an early career.
Doing internships or getting any kind of work experience “is the biggest predictor of landing a job out of college,” said Nicole Bachaud, an economist at ZipRecruiter. And those internships also help companies build pipelines of future talent.
“It’s a little demoralizing,” Iqbal said. “If they just keep hiring people with with a lot more experience, they’re not going to have anyone to grow into those senior roles.”
In recent months, Enrique Torres, an undergraduate student at the University of Mount Olive in North Carolina, has submitted about two dozen applications for an internship, with no luck.
He needs to complete a 12-week internship to graduate with his bachelor’s degree in kinesiology and exercise science later this year. Torres said he could probably find a campus job, but he would be missing out on the specific experience he wants.
“Better opportunities look better on your resume,” Torres said. “But it’s not under my control, so I’m kind of stressed.”
Internship postings tracked by jobs site Indeed last year were down compared to each of the prior five years, slipping slightly below 2019 levels. The highest share was in pharmacy at 15.5%, with marketing accounting for 7.7% of postings, followed by civil engineering with 5.3%.
And the competition for internships has gotten fierce, too. Career development site Handshake reported an average of 109 applications per internship posting in 2025, nearly double from the prior year. Certain industries posted even higher averages, such as 273 applications per posting for technology, followed by finance with 192.
Fewer internship opportunities mean smaller chances of getting hired after graduating: Roughly four-fifths of college graduates who worked during school got hired soon after graduating, according to ZipRecruiter’s estimate, compared to only about 41% of those who graduated with no work experience.
Unemployment among people ages 20 through 24 was 6.4% in March, according to data released Friday from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, down from a four-year high of 9.2% reached in September but still well above the national rate of 4.3%.
Young people are usually among the first impacted whenever the broader labor market slows down. Employers added a robust 178,000 jobs last month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday. But February saw 133,000 job losses, averaging a gain of just 22,500 over those two months. Earlier this week, the government reported that the hiring rate slowed in February to its weakest pace since 2011, outside of the pandemic recession in 2020.
And the US-Israeli war with Iran, heading into its sixth week, could further slow hiring, especially if the conflict persists.
The long-term effects on young people and companies
That intership and first-job squeeze matters for both jobseekers and employers.
The struggle “could also permanently knock them (new grads) off of their career trajectory where they end up working in a different field entirely than what they had originally planned on,” said Daniel Zhao, chief economist at Glassdoor.
And employers might have to fill in gaps in their talent pipeline by looking outside the company, Zhao said.
“People who are inside the company and who have grown over the years might be more loyal to the company, more willing to stick around and then also have the experience to skip onboarding,” he added.
Even recent graduates with significant experience are struggling.
Jessica Lopez, 27, graduated last year with a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Arizona State University. While in college, she did four internships and nine fellowships, served as student government president and networked frequently, she said.
Yet she hasn’t been able to find a full-time role in marketing with health insurance, despite more than 150 job applications. Lopez said she’s been living with her mother in San Diego while working two part-time jobs.
“I have a very vast network, especially when I was in college when I did my part-time jobs, internships and fellowships, and yeah, none of it has really helped,” Lopez said.
“I’m hoping that things will all get a little bit better for the economy,” she said.
