NPR.

This is the indicator from Planet Money.

I'm Waylon Wong.

And I'm Stephen Besaha.

And it is Jobs Friday, the first one of the new year. The Bureau of Labor Statistics is getting back

to its regular release schedule after the disruptions from the government shutdown. Today, the BLS published

numbers for December. The U.S. economy added 50,000 jobs, and the unemployment rate ticked down to

4.4%.

But the BLS also revised their figures for October and November.

The economy added 76,000 fewer jobs than previously reported.

This shows that the labor market kept cooling at the end of 2025.

Looking at specific industries, food service jobs were up in December, while retail jobs went

down. These are both sectors where some people are getting supplanted by machines.

Think fast food counter workers or cashiers. These are jobs you might associate with the economy's youngest workers, teenagers.

So what does the future of teen employment look like?

One California high school student has crunched the numbers.

I think an AI tsunami wave is going to come regardless,

and it's going to drastically change our lives.

I guess the question that we're trying to answer is not how to prevent this from happening,

but what to do in the face of AI.

Today on the show, this enterprising teenager explains her economic research project

and offers her ideas for how educators can better prepare young people for the

...