Need to Know Briefing | June 22, 2026: Entry-level jobs just got a lot harder.

Why Entry-Level Jobs Are Getting Harder to Get—and Harder to Do

AI is fundamentally reshaping what employers expect from junior workers, and the data makes the scale of that shift concrete.

PwC's 2026 AI Jobs Barometer—drawing on analysis of over 1 billion job advertisements globally and 2.4 million entry-level roles in the U.S.—found that AI-exposed entry-level roles are now seven times more likely to list traditionally senior skills than they were in 2019. Skills now expected of less experienced workers include motivational leadership, team building, stakeholder management, mentorship, and data-driven decision-making. Entry-level roles that had been "seniorized" (meaning they added more than 10 traditionally senior skills) grew 35% between 2019 and 2025, while comparable roles that had not been seniorized fell 10%. Globally, entry-level roles highly exposed to AI have flatlined. PwC U.S. has reduced the number of office locations where entry-level consultants can work from 72 to 13, citing the need to rebuild learning and development culture eroded by the pandemic and AI-driven changes to work.

Read more via Business Insider

Software engineers are facing a parallel reckoning. Job openings for software developers through late May are down about 70% from their 2022 peak, and AI is increasingly capable of doing the work that defined the profession. Employment in the information sector—which includes many tech jobs—has declined by 332,000, or 11%, between its November 2022 peak and May 2026. Undergraduate enrollment in four-year computer and information science degrees fell 8.1% last fall, a sharp reversal from 10.4% growth in 2022. Experienced developers who can steer and debug AI coding platforms are finding opportunities, but many workers with decades-long careers are seeing their options narrow.

Read more via The Wall Street Journal

CHRO Confidence Holds Near Record High—but Hiring Gets More Selective

Chief human resource officer confidence held near a series high in Q2 2026, even as hiring expectations moderated and workforce growth became more targeted.

The CHRO Confidence Index edged down one point to 58 in Q2, from a series high of 59 in Q1. Among the 111 CHROs surveyed by The Conference Board, 54% expect to increase hiring over the next six months, down from 59% in Q1. Among organizations planning to add headcount, 75% said hiring is concentrated in specific roles or functions rather than broad-based, and 65% said increases are focused on frontline or operational roles. 71% said specialized or technical roles are the hardest positions to fill. Among organizations planning to reduce hiring, 53% cited financial challenges or anticipated business risk—only 21% pointed to role elimination due to automation or AI.

Read more via The Conference Board

Remote Work Is Linked to Loneliness and Mental Health Decline

A peer-reviewed study published in the journal Science—drawing on five nationally representative surveys of nearly 600,000 American workers—found that the rise of remote work has substantially increased isolation and worsened mental health, particularly for workers who live alone.

Workers in remote-capable jobs spent roughly one additional hour alone per workday after the pandemic compared to workers in jobs requiring in-person presence, and did not make up for that isolation after hours. Remote workers who lived alone saw the sharpest effects: their likelihood of spending an entire day without any human contact rose by 7 percentage points, and their rate of spending all day alone increased at 10 times the rate of remote workers who live with others. The study estimates that the rise of remote work accounts for roughly a third of the overall increase in mental distress among American workers between 2011–2019 and 2022–2024. Separately, a Stanford-led study of 1,612 employees found that hybrid workers—those working from home two days a week—reported significantly higher job satisfaction and quit rates dropped by a third. Fully remote workers, however, showed no happiness advantage over fully in-office workers.

Read more via Science, The Wall Street Journal, Smithsonian Magazine

Nearly Half of Large Employers Plan to Shift More Health Costs to Workers

As medical costs continue rising, nearly half of large U.S. employers are planning benefit changes that will result in higher out-of-pocket expenses for employees.

In a Mercer survey of 604 U.S.-based employers, 48% of those with at least 500 employees said they plan changes in the coming year likely to increase costs for workers—such as raising deductibles or copayments. Employers expect benefit costs to increase 6.7% this year, averaging more than $18,500 per employee, outpacing both wages and inflation. Prescription drug costs are expected to rise even faster, at 9%. 31% of large employers said they plan to offer a non-traditional health plan in 2027, and 38% are considering adding one given rising costs. About half of large employers currently cover GLP-1 drugs for weight loss; 6% dropped that coverage in 2026, and another 5% are considering dropping it in 2027.

Read more via Fierce Healthcare

New York Moves to Crack Down on Ghost Job Postings

New York state lawmakers passed a bill in early June targeting "ghost jobs"—the practice of advertising positions that don't exist or aren't intended to be filled—by requiring employers and job platforms to disclose their actual hiring intentions.

Under S8877, employers with 100 or more employees and third-party job posting platforms must state in job ads whether a position is a current vacancy, an anticipated future opening, or a resume-gathering exercise, and must include an expected fill date where applicable. Employers must remove digital postings within two weeks of filling a position; third-party platforms have two weeks from learning a job was filled to remove the listing. Penalties start at $2,500 per non-compliant posting, rising to $5,000 if not corrected within 30 days, and doubling every subsequent 30 days. A report from MyPerfectResume found that nearly 1 in 3 U.S. job listings don't result in an actual hire. The bill awaits delivery to Gov. Kathy Hochul. Similar legislation is pending in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.

Read more via HR Dive

This Week's Spotlight: For the Kids, It's Summer. For Working Parents? Not So Much.

Summer break runs 10 to 12 weeks. Work doesn't pause. For the 52% of two-parent families where both parents now work full-time, that gap isn't a vacation—it's a logistics challenge with real costs for productivity, retention, and employee wellbeing. This week's Spotlight breaks down what the data says, and what employers can actually do.

▶ Read the Spotlight 

Read the full June 22nd briefing.

This week's complete Need to Know Briefing — including additional stories on ILO's first binding global standards for gig workers, consumer sentiment hitting its second-lowest reading since the 1970s, "microshifting" as an alternative to the eight-hour workday, self-diagnosis trends creating new compliance questions for employers, and the Class of 2026's priorities as they enter the job market — is available in the full interactive edition.

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About the Need to Know Briefing

The Need to Know Briefing is published weekly by Kelly, curating the most important workforce and hiring insights for HR leaders and hiring managers.