Remote work blocks mentorship, drives up youth joblessness: Fed

Economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York said on Monday that remote work explains 64% of the recent surge in unemployment among young college graduates, as distributed environments severely limit the mentorship required to train junior staff.

Mentorship gaps in distributed offices

The study highlighted that the average unemployment rate for college graduates under 29 rose by 20% from 3.1% in the 2017-19 period to 3.7% in the 2022-25 period. Researchers traced the aggregate increase to remotable occupations, where youth joblessness climbed by almost 1 percentage point between the 2017-19 and 2022-24 periods.

Employees receive substantially more feedback and mentorship when working alongside colleagues, whereas this support tapers off dramatically in remote settings, the report noted. A proprietary dataset from a Fortune 500 company showed that the firm hired fewer inexperienced workers when its offices closed during the pandemic, shifting back to younger hires once workplaces reopened.

Remote work versus AI

The timing of the unemployment surge indicates that remote work — not generative artificial intelligence — explains the bulk of the increase among recent graduates, according to the findings. The research was published on Monday by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.