College Graduates Did Everything Right, and Only 19% Believe a Good Job Awaits

The promise of a degree once felt like a golden ticket — now it often feels like a costly gamble. According to Gallup, just 19% of graduates think it’s a good time to land a “quality job,” a sharp decline from over 70% in 2022. For half a decade, recent grads have faced higher unemployment than the national average. And while AI gets the blame, most of this slide started well before it.

• University of Michigan surveys dating back to the 1960s show grads are more pessimistic now than at any point in the past four years.
• Pew data shows over 40% of graduates view socialism positively, roughly double 2010s levels, fueling figures like Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Career mirage: The return on a degree is getting repriced in real time. Graduates were told from day one that a degree was an economic necessity — yet many now carry $50K+ in debt while working retail or service jobs. With white-collar hiring set to stay weak through 2026 and AI only just beginning to eat into entry-level roles, the system is cracking.