Rutgers Center Helps New Jersey's Long-Term Unemployed

NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ — While the latest unemployment figures released Friday show the rate has dropped to 3.5 percent, its lowest rate in 50 years, it can be easy to overlook that there are millions of Americans who have simply "dropped out" of the labor force.

These are the people Rutgers University is trying to help.

In 2015, Rutgers started the New Start Career Network, part of the Heldrich Center for Workforce Development. This is a program to specifically address chronic unemployment and retrain the unemployed, who are often older and may lack the education needed for today's workforce. Long-term unemployed is defined as being out of work for 27 weeks or more. One in four job seekers qualifies as "long-term unemployed."

"Older Americans are more likely to find themselves among the long-term unemployed, and there are very limited remedies in this country to deal with these issues," said Heldrich Center founder Carl Van Horn. "The longer you are unemployed, the more stigma is attached.”

Also, unemployment benefits run out for those who qualified in the first place — a much smaller number than most Americans realize, he said.

In New Jersey, more than 4 in 10 unemployed job seekers — about 125,000 people — are deemed long-term unemployed — one of the nation’s highest shares of long-term unemployment.

Seventy percent of those New Jerseyans had been jobless for a year or longer. And roughly half were age 45 or older.

For the past six years, the New Start Career Network has provided assistance — all entirely free — to more than 6,000 older, long-term unemployed and underemployed New Jersey job seekers. The majority were between ages 55 to 64; three-quarters had a four-year college degree or higher.

The Center provides job training, networking, help writing a resume, advice on using social media, advice and analysis on the labor market and job placement and job fairs. The Center also developed a suite of digital tools to help job seekers look for jobs, improve their LinkedIn profiles, and train for job interviews, plus gives advice on how to succeed in the gig economy, managing career transitions, maintaining well-being during job search, and navigating potential bias against older job seekers.

The Center is staffed by 400 volunteers.

One of the largest benefactors to the Heldrich Center and the New Start Career Network is the Gov. Philip and Tammy Murphy Family Foundation.

"What we did here with the New Start Career Network represents the best of New Jersey, and is a model for the nation," said Murphy in a statement. "We have the Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers, our state university, devoting its expertise and its resources. We have business, government, nonprofits, individual volunteers, and other organizations coming together to solve a problem that affects the livelihood of so many."

Said one job seeker who used the Center:

“I was unemployed nearly two years, from January 2020 through November 2021. The challenges of a job search during a pandemic were unprecedented. Working with a career coach at the beginning of my job search helped me become grounded and to realize that I needed to pace myself for the long search. I learned how to sell myself."