AUSTIN -- Texas teens who search the pages of Craigslist will find no shortage of summer jobs. However, those jobs are served up with a healthy dose of competition.
“I actually got quite a few e-mails where the subject line was 'Desperate: looking for work. I need anything I can get',” said Karen Jackson, co-owner of Sprinkles Yogurt Shop on Anderson Mill Road in Northwest Austin.
Her store is among those with a listing on Craigslist. She explained those desperate responses are coming from surprising applicants.
“This summer it's been a lot of people who have degrees -- bachelor's degrees,” she said.
Summer jobs in retail and in the service industry usually reserved for teens are increasingly being gobbled-up by grown-ups.
Now, the Employment Policy Institute, a non-profit think-tank based in Washington, estimates that an additional 27,000 Texas teenagers between 16- and 19-years old are out of work this summer because of recent increases in the federal minimum wage.
The minimum wage has risen to $7.25 an hour as businesses have watched their margins shrink.
"That might mean cutting back on hours and employees and maybe automating things that were previously done by minimum wage employees,” said researcher Michael Saltsman.
He believes if teens can't get a job at places like these, they'll have a harder time getting a job that could become a career.
“They're missing out on the skills that you learn in a first job,” he said. “Dealing with a customer, dealing with a difficult customer, dealing with a supervisor.”
The minimum wage increases were signed into law in 2007. The rate has gone up more than $2 an hour since then.
