Yes, It’s Really Hard to Get a Job Out of College Right Now
The old career ladder is collapsing, and your parents might not understand why.
For decades, the path into white-collar work was straightforward: you landed an internship, moved into an entry-level role, proved yourself by handling repetitive tasks, and gradually climbed the ranks. That ladder is breaking, and for today’s graduates, the first rung feels out of reach.
Hiring has been a bit uneven this summer, and August’s job growth came in slower than expected (22,000 jobs added). For recent grads, unemployment has edged up to 5.8%. The takeaway isn’t to panic or stop looking—it’s to be strategic. As AI impacts the nature of entry level roles, candidates who show clear, job-ready skills and project evidence have the best odds of moving forward.
AI is absorbing the tasks that once defined entry-level jobs. Research summaries, note-taking, data cleaning, drafting memos, even basic coding—a lot of it can now be handled by generative AI tools in seconds. Employers are opening fewer entry-level positions, but have higher expectations for them.
At the same time, the jobs that remain are overwhelmed with AI-driven applications. Students are using ChatGPT and other tools to mass-apply to hundreds of postings. Recruiters, swamped with thousands of applications per posting, increasingly ignore them altogether. Even highly qualified grads are getting ghosted. Some computer science majors are looking for work at Chipotle just to pay bills.
In short: getting a first job out of college is harder than it has been in decades.
But There are Still Great Jobs Out There
Traditional entry-level roles may be less in demand by employers, but they’re being replaced with something more powerful. The very skills that make the old ladder harder to climb—automation, AI tools, new workflows—are the same skills that give new grads an edge.
Many college students are AI-native. Where experienced workers are still catching up, you already know how to make these tools useful. Companies are hiring for that right now.
Being AI-native lets you have a much bigger impact than previous entry-level hires. A single analyst or sales rep who knows how to harness AI can outperform what used to take a whole team. Instead of doing grunt work for their manager, today’s entry-level hires are managing AI—designing prompts, reviewing outputs, and applying judgment to amplify results.
Jobs that require AI skills are growing – and paying well too. The numbers speak volumes:
- Graduates stepping into machine learning roles today are commanding base salaries between $190K–$260K, with total comp often far higher thanks to equity grants.
- Base salaries for non-manager AI workers with 0–3 years of experience jumped about 12% from 2024 to 2025—the largest increase across experience levels.
- Some AI-native professionals are pulling over $1 million annually before they even turn 25.
Although the jobs available may not be the ones that you expected, they create an opportunity that allows you to start on a path to a higher-paying job earlier in your career than ever before.
How to Land A Great New Job
The key to breaking into these new roles is showing that you’re not just a college graduate—you’re an entry+ candidate: fluent in new tools and ready to contribute from day one.
Here’s your checklist for how to show you are an AI-Ready Candidate:
How RippleMatch Can Help
On RippleMatch, your profile isn’t just a resume—it’s a signal. When you highlight your AI fluency and a mindset for impact, you’re connected directly with employers who are actively hiring for early-career talent. And because of how the platform works, students on RippleMatch see a 20x higher chance of landing an interview than on traditional job boards.
That’s because every match is intentional. You’re only surfaced for opportunities where your skills line up with what the employer is actually looking for. Every role on the platform is active, so you’re never applying into dead postings. Instead of being filtered out by an algorithm, your profile goes straight to a real recruiter or hiring manager. And unlike the black hole of job boards, every candidate gets a response.
AI has compressed the path from graduate to high-impact contributor, which can mean your path to six figure salaries is shorter but only if you prepare smartly. The entry+ candidate is no longer theoretical, it’s the hiring market’s highest-value commodity. And with tools like RippleMatch, you’re not just competing, you’re leading the way..
Get Started Today
Yes, it’s harder than ever to land your first job out of school. Hiring is slowing, traditional roles are being automated away, and the mass-apply doom loop leaves many graduates disheartened. But it’s also a moment of opportunity: AI has created a new category of entry+ roles—jobs with more responsibility, faster growth, and higher pay than the “starter jobs” of the past.
If you can show your AI fluency, highlight impact, and position yourself as an entry+ candidate, you can land roles that put you ahead of the curve. And with RippleMatch as your platform, you can make sure the right employers actually see you.
Get started today by creating your free profile here.
