Help not wanted: Jobless rate for ages 16-24 reaches 21.3 percent

Earning money for that first car - or just putting gas in one - may be harder than ever this summer for many teenagers looking for summer employment.

With the state's unemployment rate at a post-World War II high of 13.4 percent in March, the challenge for young workers to find work has intensified since the trend began in 2008, according to state and federal data.

Nevada workers between ages 16 and 24 are coping with an unemployment rate of 21.3 percent, nearly twice the level for other age groups, according to a February workforce report from the Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation.

"I don't think it's going to improve any time soon, not until the general economy improves," said Jered McDonald, an economist with DETR. "The problem now is the experienced workers are taking the jobs. The inexperienced workers are finding it harder and harder to find employment."

He said the trend is likely to persist into 2011.

Maria Chavez, 17, said she's been looking for work since last year, filling out eight applications to no avail.

"A lot of people don't want to quit their jobs because they can't find any other one," Chavez said after leaving Carson High School on Thursday. "They work all day and all night sometimes."

Robin Bleuss, who runs the technology center and job board at Carson High School, said she has noticed a sharp decline in potential employers asking her to post jobs this year. She got her first request just two weeks ago.

In previous years, Bleuss said, she would post jobs from state offices, medical centers, day cares and even residents calling for a student to mow a lawn. Today, those have largely gone away.

"It's been just an amazing year," Bleuss said. "I'm not even getting the phone calls I used to get. I feel so bad for the kids. There just isn't anything this year."

Other students with jobs say they are lucky.

John Bragg, 15, works for the Carson City Latch Key program. He's been employed for about six months, unlike many of his friends.

"Most can't find a job," Bragg said. "They're looking for a job and they can't find one anywhere they go."

Nationwide, the unemployment rate for young people is a post-war high of 19.2 percent, according to the Employment Polices Institute in Washington, D.C.

That represents a 7.4 percent increase in the unemployment rate for young Americans since December 2007, a larger increase compared to the recessions of 2001, 1990 and 1982.

"The 2007 recession has produced an unemployment crisis for young workers - one that has increased labor market inequalities on a level not seen by any other age group," Kathryn Anne Edwards and Alexander Hertel-Fernandez wrote for the EPI this month. "Whether they are one of the many who have left the labor market discouraged or one of the many that have taken low-skilled work, the recession will have a significant scarring effect on their human capital and therefore on their earnings."

Kelsey Machart, 16, who has a job at the Boys and Girls Clubs in Carson City, said Thursday her brother applied to the local movie theater, but was competing with many applicants.

She held her hand a few inches off of the table.

"He said the stacks of applications were two piles this high," Machart said.

Cameron Menke, 16, was among those applicants, but didn't get hired. He adds he's not really looking for a job right now, even through he wouldn't mind one.

"People are still hiring," he said, calling himself an optimist.