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Press Release

Philadelphia Fed President Harker Highlights Changes in the Job Market

14 Apr ’22

Philadelphia Fed President Harker spoke to an audience at Rider University about changes in the job market but stated that inflation is “proving more troublesome.” He also highlighted Philadelphia Fed's research on how workers without college degrees are finding new opportunities.

For immediate release

Contact: Daneil Mazone, Manager, Media Relations

Lawrence Township, NJ ― Patrick T. Harker, president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, told an audience at Rider University that after suffering disproportionately higher rates of unemployment during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, workers without college degrees saw new opportunities emerge as the economy reopened.

Citing new research from Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, Harker noted that “some job postings that before the pandemic might have required a college degree, no longer did” when industries reopened and employers began looking for workers. All told, a year into the pandemic, there were 2.3 million more opportunity occupations available — that is, jobs that don’t require a college degree and that pay the median wage or better — than there were prior to the emergence of COVID-19.

“This is clearly a salutary trend, and we should be thinking of ways to build on it,” Harker said.

Read the speech.