Some economists speculate that the disproportionate decline could be because the age group has been ravaged by repeated crises, leaving their position in the labor market vulnerable. They lost work early in their careers in 2008, then slowly recovered and found their jobs once again under threat amid layoffs in 2020 and an ongoing shift to automation.
“This group has been hit by automation, by globalization,” says David Dorn, a Swiss economist who studies labor markets.
That fragility theory makes sense to Mr. Rizzo.
He had seen the Navy as his ticket out of Louisiana poverty and had expected to have a career in the service until he broke his back in basic training. He retired from the army after a few years. He then turned around, received a two-year degree in Georgia and began a bachelor’s degree at Arizona State University – with the dream of one day working to cure cancer.
Then the Great Recession hit. Mr. Rizzo had been working nights in a lab to pay rent and tuition, but the job ended abruptly in 2009. Phoenix was ground zero for the fallout from the financial implosion.
Frantic job applications failed, and Mr. Rizzo had to drop out of school. Even worse, he found himself facing impending homelessness. His tax refund saved him by allowing him and his wife to move back to Louisiana where there were more jobs. But after they divorced, he hit rock bottom.
“I had nothing to show for my life after 20,” he explained.
Mr. Rizzo spent the next decade rebuilding. He worked his way through various corporate positions where he taught himself skills in Excel and Microsoft SharePoint, remarried, had two sons and bought a house.
Yet he regularly risked losing work to downsizing or technology, including at the end of last year. The company he worked for wanted him to get a new role, perhaps as a traveling salesman, when his desk job disappeared. But his sons have special needs and that was not an option.
