Anthropology graduates face the highest unemployment rate of any college major, at 7.9%. 

Their median early career salary is $45,000. 

This data comes from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, drawn from the U.S. Census Bureau and American Community Survey (IPUMS).

According to the data, unemployment among recent college graduates generally stands at 5.6%. 

But it becomes a different story when you sort the unemployment by majors. 

Over 70 majors were tracked by their unemployment rate; however, today’s visualization focuses on the top 30 majors with the highest rate. 

TL;DR

• The two highest-paying fields for recent college graduates (Computer Science and Computer Engineering) are also two of the hardest to land a job in right now.
• From the list of the top 30 majors with the highest unemployment rate, Mechanical Engineering and Miscellaneous Biological Science have the lowest rates

CONTEXT MATTERS HERE: 

What the data reveals is less a story about which subjects are worth studying and more a story about a labour market that is struggling to absorb new degree holders across a surprisingly wide range of fields.

The benchmark problem

Before any individual major is examined, four numbers set the context: 

1. Recent college graduates as a whole face a 5.6% unemployment rate. 
2. Young workers without a college degree face a 7.8% unemployment rate. 
3. College-educated workers aged 22 to 65 face a 3.1% unemployment rate. 
4. American adults overall face 4.2%.

The college degree still works, but it delivers less protection than those paying for it are typically told. 

A recent graduate with a degree is more likely to be unemployed than the average American adult. 

The diploma reduces risk compared to having no degree at all, but it does not deliver the near-guaranteed employment outcome that decades of higher education marketing have implied. 

That gap between promise and data is the backdrop against which the major-by-major numbers should be read.

Tech majors also in trouble

The conventional narrative about graduate unemployment points toward the arts. 

The data tells a more complicated story. 

Fine Arts sits at 7.7% unemployment and Performing Arts at 7.0%, but Computer Engineering, at 7.8%, ranks above both. 

Computer Science follows at 7.0%, tied with Performing Arts. 

The two highest-paying fields in the entire top 30 are also two of the hardest to land a job in right now.

This is not a coincidence. It is a direct data imprint of the technology sector’s contraction from 2022 to 2024. 

According to tracking site Layoffs.fyi, the tech industry shed over 260,000 jobs in 2023 alone, with major cuts at Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and Meta continuing into 2024. 

Entry-level and new graduate hiring was disproportionately affected. 

The students who enrolled in Computer Engineering and Computer Science degree programmes during the pandemic-era tech boom graduated into a sector that had sharply reversed course. 

That context matters particularly now. 

As of early 2026, artificial intelligence-driven automation concerns are further reshaping entry-level tech hiring, with several major firms publicly stating they intend to use AI tools to reduce junior software engineering headcount. 

The pharmacy anomaly

The pharmacy major has a 5.6% unemployment rate, with a $40,000 average early career wage. 

A licensed healthcare professional requiring years of specialised graduate-level training pays less at entry than Philosophy ($52,000), Political Science ($52,000), and Ethnic Studies ($52,000), and considerably less than Mathematics ($70,000) or Business Analytics ($72,000).

The explanation lies in the structure of pharmacy careers rather than the market value of the credential. 

Most pharmacy graduates enter residency or clinical training programmes immediately after degree completion, roles that carry formal employment status but pay at trainee rather than qualified professional rates. 

Fields with more employment

From the list of the top 30 majors with the highest unemployment rate, Mechanical Engineering and Miscellaneous Biological Science have the lowest rates (44% each). 

These majors seem to be rarely centred in college counselling conversations. 

In terms of employment activities in the U.S., they outperform Computer Engineering and Computer Science, and even nearly rival them in terms of early career wages. 

ELI5

The U.S. labour market is one in which a college degree remains a meaningful advantage, but recent graduates as a class are experiencing above-average unemployment. The fields hit hardest right now include some of the most lucrative and supposedly practical credentials available.

Source:

Federal Reserve Bank of New York | Layoffs.fyi |