College Grads Flood U.S. Labor Market With Diminished Prospects

05-19-2010 • Bloomberg.com

Unemployment among people under 25 years old was 19.6 percent in April, the highest level since the Labor Department began tracking the data in 1948. Their economic travails may haunt Democrats in the November midterm elections. The youthful voters who helped propel the party to victory in the 2006 Congressional elections and gave the 2008 Obama campaign much of its vibrancy are showing signs of waning enthusiasm. Democrats held a 62 percent to 30 percent advantage over Republicans in 2008 among “millennials,” born after 1980, according to the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press in Washington D.C. Their 32-point margin shrank to 18 points this year, with 55 percent leaning Democratic and 37 percent Republican, based on polls taken from January through April.