October 28, 2026
Help Wanted: Just Not Teens!
By Quinn Dwyer
By Jeffrey Wang
Sitting at the dinner table, my mother asks, “Has school ended yet?”
“Yeah, today was the last day.” I respond, stuffing pieces of fried tofu in my face.
“Well, what are you doing then?” she asks.
“Uhh I applied for some jobs but I haven’t really heard back.” I say.
Without looking up from her phone, she asks: “What about internships? Did you apply for any of those?”
“Yeah, but I got rejected from those . . . that’s why I applied for a summer job.”
Finally looking up, almost disappointed, she says: “How long since you applied? When I was young, you just walked in and talked to the manager. If they liked you, they would give you a job on the spot.”
“They don’t let you walk in anymore, everything is online nowadays.” I say.
When the summer rolls around, school’s over, but the work doesn’t stop. Starting in the winter, many high school students are already applying for internships and summer experiences, the competition getting fiercer with every passing month.
Historically, teenagers working in ice cream shops, as lifeguards, and in retail has been a rite of passage and a form of community building that brings young people together.
In New York City, students who need to or want to work have three main options:
- Summer Youth Employment Program & Ladders for Leaders (SYEP):A city-funded program and considered the most widespread and accessible way for students to get a summer job/internship. There’s no guarantee that students will get a spot though, as it operates through a lottery. Approximately 100,000 students are enrolled in the program each year, although roughly 155,000 apply for the program.
- Summer Programs: They can be private, for-profit institutions or nonprofit/city-funded programs. These are usually merit-based programs and require an application and interview. They are more selective than SYEP, and seats are limited. These also include pre-college and study abroad programs, many of which are ‘pay to play,’ although scholarships are available.
- Traditional Jobs: If none of the above apply, then you’re likely going to have to go job- hunting yourself, which can prove to be hard if you’re not super well connected.
While summer programs and internships are great, the number of summer jobs, the epitome of teenager life in classic teen movies, has declined. Teenagers are increasingly giving up hope on getting traditional summer jobs, which begs the question: why? Is it just an interest in more “academic” based programs, or an issue with employment itself?
The statistics can tell the story. In 2000, about 51.7% of U.S. teens ages 16 to 19 worked during the summer. By 2021, it fell to 36.6%, an increase from previous years but a drastic decrease from almost two decades prior.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were 7.4 million job openings and 5.3 million hires in June 2026, suggesting that employers are prioritizing retention over new hires, potentially impacting teenage employment, though the correlation isn’t direct. Similarly, the same report highlights U.S. payroll employment fell in July 2026 by 40,000 in leisure and hospitality jobs and 19,000 in retail, which might explain the decrease in teen employment trends.
Another reason could be the obvious: a decline in teens seeking employment could have contributed to the amount of available jobs. Teenagers prioritizing sports or summer programs may not be inclined to find a traditional job, a trend that has been ongoing since 2000.
Other reasons include the rise of artificial intelligence, both in replacing the labor needed and screening out potential teenage applicants.
One rising senior, Maxxane Wallace-Segal, who attends Stuyvesant High School, says, “I haven’t actually had any jobs or in-person internships, I’ve instead participated in online internships, application-based scholarship programs, and in-person events like at the UN. This summer I’m running my own program (The Ohel Fellowship for Muslim & Jewish Dialogue) that meets twice a week in the evening.”
Another high school student, rising junior Louis You, who attends the Brooklyn Latin School, says, “I feel like it’s the result of students prioritizing academics. In my experience, one in every three people I know has some sort of summer job or internship lined up for the summer. I will say, however, that the most common ways teenagers can find employment is through SYEP or other employment programs.”
Eager to find out what the root cause of this teenager unemployment crisis is, I embarked on a journey.
First order of business: Looking up “What jobs hire 16-year-olds in NYC?” Immediately, Google AI tells me “retail, food service, and recreational jobs.” Okay, so I click on Indeed, browsing the different jobs that are marked under “teen jobs.”
Of course, the algorithm isn’t correct most of the time, so I have to manually check each position to see if there is a minimum age requirement or education level. Finally, I find a job that appears to not have any restrictive requirements.
“At Your Service Center Associate, Queens Center – Part Time” (Macys).
Now, I begin applying.
Step 1: Applying online. Most places don’t accept paper resumes anymore. Any attempt to go in person and physically hand them your resume is met with a “please see our careers portal online.”
Step 2: Actually applying: First, normal contact information, standard. Then, age. Surprisingly, they have options for 17-year-olds, 16-year-olds, and even applicants under the age of 15.
Are you legally allowed to work? Yes
How many hours can you work? As a teenager, I want to be realistic. Between hanging out with friends and other responsibilities, 21 to 30 hours a week seems reasonable.
Are you interested in a year round or seasonal job? Seasonal
“What is one time you delivered excellent customer service?” Well, because I have limited service experience, I struggle to figure out what to write about. I bring up my experience at a school open house and my experience with running my school’s model UN conference. Hopefully, that’s enough.
Do I want to work weekends? Part time only.
Do I feel comfortable learning new technology? Yes
When are you available to work? Afternoons, Nights & Weekends – Available weekdays starting at 1pm, plus Fridays evenings to close, and Saturdays, & Sundays 9am–10pm. Again, being realistic, I’m not working 40 hours a week from 9am–10pm.
How much customer service experience do you have? Less than a year.
Resume: Uploaded.
Cover Letter: Had to search up how to write a proper one, but also uploaded.
Submit. Now we wait for a response.
7:56 p.m. You have a new message.
The email reads:
Hello Jeffrey,
We really appreciate your interest in our company, but at this time we are not moving you to the next stage of the hiring process.
Great.
In a desperate attempt, I try appealing to small local businesses, testing my luck with the community. My first stop, the local Chinese supermarket (G-Mart), fails. While friendly, the language barrier makes it difficult for me to communicate effectively with the staff and owners. My second stop, a local cafe, starts off promising, but I learn very quickly that my age and availability disqualify me from the possibility of employment. When I visited the local laundromat, the owners politely declined help, then told me to focus on school and studying.
Though disappointing, none of my experiences came as a surprise. With the job market constantly fluctuating and business owners’ changing perceptions of teenagers, we have been essentially wiped from the picture. My experience isn’t an end all be all, though. Everyone’s experiences are different, but for many, this is the reality of finding traditional summer employment.
As September rolls around in New York City and school starts, my search unfortunately comes to a stop. While I have the fortune of being able to not work, that isn’t the reality for many teens who rely on these opportunities to survive.
