A Gen Xer with a master’s degree has been looking for a job for 9 years. He’s slowly running out of money.

Chris Putro, 55, has been looking for a job for a job for the last nine years. 

In 2013, Chris Putro got fired from his financial analyst job at a tech company. More than a decade later, he’s still looking for work.

Despite having a bachelor’s and master’s degree in chemistry — and sending out countless applications — Putro said he’s had little luck in the job market.

“I’ve gotten a total of four phone interviews,” the 55-year-old, who’s based in Los Angeles, told B-17 via email. Three of these employers ended up “ghosting” him, while the other one ended the interview call early after deciding he was overqualified for the job.

When Putro lost his job, he was in his 16th year working for the same employer. After taking stock of his finances, he estimated that he had enough savings to get by for a little over a decade if necessary.

“I made enough in those 16 years to survive for another 11,” he said.

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Based on his initial forecast, he would have run out of money sometime this year. However, Putro said his stock market investments have performed better than he expected, which he thinks could buy him a “few more years.”

Putro said it’s been helpful financially that he has no student debt or children. However, he said the only source of income over the last decade has been the $50 a week he gets for producing a standup comedy show in the Los Angeles area. He considers this to be effectively “volunteer work” that helps him stay busy, but as things stand, it’s not doing much to slow the steady decline of his savings.

“Thinking about when I might run out of money and lose all my possessions is a very difficult thought process for me,” he said.

Putro is among the Americans who are having a hard time finding work. In large part, it’s because businesses across the US have significantly pulled back on hiring. The ratio of job openings to unemployed people — an indicator of job availability — has declined considerably over the past two years.

To be sure, both the unemployment rate and layoff rate remain low compared to historical levels. However, the hiring slowdown means that many of the people who are looking for work — whether it be because they were laid off, have just graduated from college, or are returning to the workforce — are having a much harder time than the job seekers of a few years ago.

Putro shared his job search strategies — and why he’s unsure whether his age is helping or hurting him on his job hunt.

Application burnout can make it harder to find a job

In the early 1990s, Putro earned a bachelor’s in chemistry from La Salle University and a master’s in chemistry from UCLA. He worked at a pharmacy for a couple of years until 1998, when he landed a customer service job at a tech company. In 2006, he began working as a financial analyst for the same employer — a position he held until he was fired.

After losing his job, Putro didn’t immediately start applying for jobs. He said he took about two years to think about what he wanted to do with the rest of his life. Then, about nine years ago, his job hunt officially began.

Over the past decade, Putro said he’s applied “irregularly” for jobs — anywhere between zero and 40 applications in a given month.

“I get burned out and wait a bit and hope that there’s turnover in a company’s HR, he said.

Putro said he generally looks for roles through Indeed, LinkedIn, and the websites of major local employers like CBS and NBCUniversal. Given his prior work experience, job platforms tend to nudge him to apply for financial analyst roles.

“I apply for jobs I’m qualified for,” he said. “People have told me to apply for minimum-wage jobs, but I don’t know how to find them.”

Despite his efforts, Putro hasn’t had much luck. He said he’s not sure whether being 55 years old is helping or hurting him in the job market.

“I keep reading that employers will absolutely not hire anyone my age because of false assumptions, but also that they prefer people my age because millennials and younger have a poor work ethic,” he said.

Going forward, Putro plans to continue sending out applications. He said October is typically the month when he begins applying more aggressively.

“I applied to two jobs this week that I was a great match for on paper, but no reply as usual,” he said.