Recent data released by EconJobMarket (EJM) for the current recruitment cycle point to a worrying shift in the landscape for academic economists. The numbers strongly suggest that the profession is entering an era of systemic hiring freezes and constrained budgets. As the main clearinghouse for academic positions, EJM’s activity serves as a critical barometer for the sector’s overall health.
Our own platform, Econ-Jobs, targets a far wider employment spectrum, ranging from academia to the public and private sectors. However, when we zoom into the academic niche, the signals are unmistakable and align with the “perfect storm” described by Chris Brunet in his recent analysis, “The Collapse of the Econ PhD Job Market”: opportunities are shrinking, applicants are surging, and the imbalance between supply and demand is worsening.
A Steep Decline in Academic Openings
The most visible change this year is the decline in the volume of job advertisements, confirming that the PhD is no longer the guaranteed “golden ticket” it once was.
- Total job postings are down ~13% from last year.
- Compared to the three-year average, postings have fallen by roughly 25%.
This is not a mild fluctuation, it is a structural contraction extending across the academic hierarchy. Assistant Professor openings are down nearly 10% year-over-year. More tellingly, the postdoctoral market, traditionally the “pressure valve” that absorbs displaced PhDs, is stagnant relative to last year (-2%) and ~15% below its recent three-year average.
The “Perfect Storm”: Why the Safety Nets are Gone
The data indicates that the market is transitioning from a cyclical downturn into a structural mismatch. As Brunet points out, this is driven by a convergence of factors closing off the traditional exit routes for economists.
1. The Academic Freeze Universities are facing significant headwinds. Across North America, institutions are grappling with budget deficits and enrollment cliffs, leading to widespread hiring freezes.
- North America in Retreat: Jobs in North America are down ~39% versus the previous season and ~44% relative to the three-year average.
- Several institutions are reportedly failing to fill lines even when faculty retire, imposing partial freezes rather than allowing replacements.
2. The Federal Reserve Contraction Historically, the Federal Reserve system has been a massive consumer of economics PhDs. However, the Fed is currently navigating a period of historic operating losses due to high interest rates. This financial strain has forced a quiet but significant tightening of recruitment, closing off a vital pipeline for new graduates.
3. The Tech Sector Pivot The “Plan B” for many economists—big tech—has also become precarious. Following the massive wave of tech layoffs in 2023, 2024 and 2025, companies like Amazon and Uber are not only leaner but are also shifting their hiring focus. There is a growing preference for Data Scientists and Computer Scientists over pure economists, as the skill sets in causal inference are increasingly automated or handled by CS-adjacent roles.
Europe: A Modest Counterpoint
While North America contracts, Europe offers a slight reprieve, though not a solution.
- Postings in Europe are up ~4% compared to last year.
- However, they remain ~17% below the historical average. This suggests that while Europe is serving as a partial shock absorber, it lacks the capacity to accommodate the overflow from the US market.
Demand Is Rising, Not Falling
Despite fewer openings, the pipeline of candidates continues to expand, creating a bottleneck:
- Registered applicants are up ~11%.
- First-time doctoral candidates entering the market are up ~7%.
With roughly 1,400 new PhDs competing for roughly 400 tenure-track spots in the US, the competition has become fierce. Total applications are up 22%, and applications per posting have risen by ~36% year-over-year.
Why This Matters
The economics profession plays an outsized role in public policy, inflation management, and industrial regulation. A weaker academic pipeline ultimately means reduced research capacity and fewer experts feeding into the public and private sectors.
The conclusion is difficult to avoid: The current contraction is real, not anecdotal. Whether this marks a temporary adjustment or a longer-term reshaping of the profession will depend on institutional budgets and the willingness of universities to maintain research capacity. But for now, the data reflects a genuine and substantial shift—one that will leave a visible imprint on the profession for years to come.
