The past year has seen strong job growth in the U.S., with employers adding more than 2 million jobs during 2024. But for people who have been laid off or are otherwise unemployed, those figures dont capture the challenges of navigating the current job market.As of the most recent jobs report, more than 7 million Americans were unemployed. And according to The Wall Street Journal, a significant number of those people1.6 millionhave been looking for a new job for at least six months.Average length of job searchOver the past two years, the share of people job hunting for six months or longer has increased by more than 50%. That means that on the whole, it now takes job seekers an average of six months to find a new positionabout a month longer than was typical when hiring was at its peak in early 2023.As of December, 1.8 million people were continuing to file for recurring unemployment benefits.This shift has been particularly noticeable in office jobs, especially across sectors like tech and media where workers have been subjected to layoffs in recent years. While fewer tech workers were laid off in 2024 than the year prior, more than 150,000 people were still affected by job cuts, according to Layoffs.fyi.The slower rate of hiring of unemployed workers is not necessarily reflected in the overall unemployment rate, which has remained relatively low at 4.2% despite inching up slightly in 2024. (Hiring is still robust in sectors like healthcare, manufacturing, and transportation, for example.) But in contrast to the post-pandemic hiring boom, there are fewer job openings overall, with only one job listing per unemployed worker, as compared to two listings per worker in 2022.Industry-specific factorsAs Fast Company has reported, workers faced hurdles in the job market for much of 2024. There are a number of reasons why this issue may be persisting in certain industries. Many tech companies have simply pulled back on hiring after a period of rapid growth as the pandemic faded, not to mention layoffs.There could be a mismatch between what companies are looking for in new hires and what job seekers want, particularly at a moment when some employers have implemented strict return-to-office mandates. Wage growth has fallen, which indicates that employers feel less pressure to compete for talent. Then theres the threat of AI, which has already redefined the hiring processand is slowly starting to reshape the workforce.