ROCHESTER, Minn. (KTTC) -- Good news for teens needing to earn cash this summer. Summer employment is off to its strongest start since 2006. Or that's what statistics from the labor department reveal, but just how easy is it for some area teens to find employment?
Many of the young adults we spoke with today said they have been at their summer job for 3-plus years, but some of their friends who are looking for a new gig, are grasping at straws as they fill out app after app.
"Anything else? Thanks please pull ahead."
Whipping up cool treats for customers is all in a days work for these DQ employees.
"It'll be $6.10, do you want the whip cream and cherry on your malt today?"
For college students Sondra Roerish and Ryan Yetzer, it was a breeze finding a summer job.
"It was easy, I've been working here since I was in high school, so finding a summer job was just coming back to work here," said Roerish.
But it's a brain freeze kind of headache for some of their friends, looking for a summer gig.
"A lot of my friends are finding it very difficult to find jobs. A lot of places want you to be there for more than full-time then just the summer or they already have their summer help hired," explained Roerish.
"A lot of them had to come back early or start to find a job, some of them are still looking. A lot of them had to like put ads in the newspaper for nannying jobs and stuff like that because they were having a hard time getting a job," said Yetzer.
According to Labor Department statistics, the number of 16 to 19-year olds who were hired in May totaled 157,000 that's more than double the number of jobs taken by teens a year earlier. While national statistics reveal teen employment is up, Sargents on Second's Manager, Scott Moon, said hiring over the last few years has drastically changed.
"We've really seen a high rate of adults applying in the last 3 to 4 years which does cut into our college and high school kids, but even this year my stack of high school and college kids was very, very big," said Moon.
In total Sargent's employees 24 high school and college kids during the summer months.
If you're still looking for a summer job, you might have missed the boat. Many of the employers we spoke with say they already have all of their summer help hired and in fact, most workers have already started.
