Sometimes the thought of leaving Hawaiʻi to seek more job opportunities in the continental United States crosses Nainoa Alefaio's mind.
Although he recently landed a job as a teacher at Kawaikini New Century Public Charter School on Kauaʻi, he's on a one-year contract with no guaranteed permanent position.
Alefaio is completing his master's degree at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa and hopes to graduate this academic year. But opportunities outside the state look more promising for him.
“It's frustrating to have to think about whether to leave once in a while,” he said. “Once you get a job, you can relax a little, but there's always going to be that idea in the back of your head that if somehow this doesn't work, and I don't find something, I may have to go somewhere else.”
That sentiment is widely shared among college students in Hawaiʻi. Some say they are entering an uncertain post-graduation landscape with the Trump administration's federal hiring freeze and cuts to research grants.
Many also say it's already hard enough with Hawaiʻi's high cost of living.
Local economists predict the administration's shift in federal policies will trigger a mild recession in Hawai‘i.
A recent report from the University of Hawaiʻi Economic Research Organization attributed this to a decline in tourism, federal worker layoffs, and volatile tariffs, which are driving up the price of goods.
UHERO also expected the recession to last through 2026, with a slow recovery into 2028.
“Tariffs alone run the risk of pushing the economy into a recession and creating inflation at the same time, which is something that hasn't happened in 50 years,” said Paul Brewbaker, principal of TZ Economics.
He said baby boomers were the last generation who graduated from high school or college “in a topsy-turvy macroeconomic environment.” He added that the unemployment rate during that time was 10%.
The unemployment rate is now at nearly 3%, according to the Hawaiʻi Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism.
UH does not have data on how graduates fare after college.
Lawmakers introduced a measure that would have required UH to collect and publicly report graduate outcomes and appropriate funds for two full-time positions.
Rep. Andrew Garrett, who introduced House Bill 1320, said the measure would've helped students figure out the job outcomes in specific career fields for different college majors.
“This is a national issue, that they're not just collecting the students' tuition and kicking them out without any kind of career prospects,” he said. “So just making sure that since the University of Hawaiʻi does receive state funding, that we're holding them accountable, to make sure that students who graduate from UH have good jobs waiting for them.”
Garrett said the University of Virginia has a dashboard of how students fare in the job market three to five years after graduating from college.
The bill stalled in conference committee due to a lack of agreement on funding positions. But Garrett said lawmakers may pick up where the measure left off.
A report from the state Department of Labor and Industrial Relations showed that some of the fastest-growing industries are health care, food services, and drinking places, such as bars and nightclubs.
Alefaio said he's searching for food service jobs in Seattle, Washington, that are not tied to his degree.
“Big cities in the Pacific Northwest have a booming market for eateries,” he said.
He said his family in Washington has been faring well.
“I see how they live,” he said. “They live more comfortably than I do here as a graduate student.”
UH student Patricia Chong said she feels a little more secure because she's studying optometry. She's a third-year transfer student from the University of California, Davis, but was born and raised in Hawaiʻi.
She plans to return home, but said that might not be an option.
“The way everything just falls, the opportunities are less here than on the mainland,” Chong said. “It almost feels like in four to six years, when I'm done studying, it might not even be possible to live anywhere.”
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