The rise of remote work may have made it easier to work from anywhere in the country, but young people are more determined than ever to make it in one destination: New York City.
New York is the No. 1 place where new college grads are applying for jobs, according to new data from Handshake, the college and recent grad career site.
It's a continued pattern from pre-Covid days, but to an even greater extreme: New York City received the most applications from recent grads prior to the pandemic, and it's only gotten more competitive. NYC saw 6.7x more applications between 2022-2023 compared with the same period in 2018-2019.
It also saw twice as many applications as the No. 2 city, Chicago.
Here are the top 15 cities where today's college grads are applying for jobs most:
- New York
- Chicago
- Dallas
- Los Angeles
- Atlanta
- Boston
- San Francisco
- Austin, Texas
- Washington D.C.
- Houston
- Seattle
- Denver
- Philadelphia
- San Diego
- Miami
New York may be the No. 1 work and life destination for new grads, but it'll cost them.
New York's Manhattan borough is the most expensive place to live in the U.S. by a wide margin. Living costs there are more than double the national average, and median rent remains at record high of nearly $4,400 a month.
But not all college grads are willing to take on the expensive lifestyle: A majority of recent grads say inflation and living costs are making them re-think their post-college plans, with 1 in 3 say they're looking to move to a cheaper city after school, according to a recent ZipRecruiter survey.
Miami, Atlanta and Philadelphia have become more popular in recent years, while Seattle, San Diego and San Francisco have fallen a few spots.
Overall, recent grads are more willing than ever to make a major move for a new job: A majority, 83%, of applications submitted via Handshake in the last year were to jobs out of state from where the student lived. That's nearly double the share of people willing to move for a job pre-pandemic, when 44% applications were submitted out of state.
And while hybrid work is still popular (41% of students say they're more likely to apply to a hybrid job), they're putting more thought in where they want their office, and their new post-grad life, to be. Some 72% of applications on Handshake in the last year were to roles with a specific job location, rather than a remote or work-from-anywhere listing.
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