Koch Heiress Editor for Wall Street Journal Gets Skewered for Report Asking Why Young Men Are ‘Ditching’ the Workforce
(Photo Credit: @MJ_Koch on X)
An editor for the Wall Street Journal has been getting absolutely skewered on social media for a report asking why young men have been “ditching” the workforce in recent years, with some critics saying she missed a key reason: major companies going out of their way to not hire White men.
Associate Editor Mary Julia Koch has also been hammered for a different reason: her ultra-rich background. Some social media users argued she wasn’t the best messenger on the plight of young guys trying to land jobs, considering she is the daughter of David Koch, the late businessman and Republican mega-donor; the fortune Koch’s mother inherited in 2019 is estimated to be worth $81.2 billion.
The backlash started shortly after Koch posted her video report on X on Thursday.
“Where did all the guys in the office go?” she asked at the start, while strolling past a few women sitting at their office computers.
Koch reported women have 176,000 more payroll jobs than men, which is a stark change from three decades ago, when men had 7 million more. She said some of this is due to offshoring and automation hitting male-dominated fields like manufacturing and construction, as well as Gen Z men “witnessing the effects of the Great Recession and Corporate America’s push to bring more women into male-dominated fields.”
Those factors have led to many American men just opting out of looking for a job entirely, she said. Some have even embraced becoming a “stay at-home boyfriend” while their girlfriends go out and make the bacon. Koch finished by saying “we can fix this,” though, by having men go into industries like healthcare and education, which have traditionally been more female-driven.
Her report has been viewed nearly 8 million times — and been met with some heated responses.
Rep. Brandon Gill (R-TX) posted it was silly to act like it’s a “big mystery” why this happened, after companies spent decades “working to purge young White men from entry level jobs.”
Another viral post made a similar point; it included a screenshot of a 2023 Bloomberg article which reported 94% of S&P 100 jobs since 2020 had went to “people of color,” as well as a screenshot from a 2025 Washington Post report showing White Americans had lost 904,000 jobs since February 2020; Hispanic, Black, and Asian Americans had all gained at least 768,000 jobs since then.
Several other users responded to Koch’s report by saying White men had been discriminated against for years.
While right-wing pundit Benny Johnson and a grip of other users mocked Koch for being a “filthy rich” billionaire heiress who should’ve probably had someone else handle the story.
Koch did not immediately respond to Mediaite’s request for comment on the blowback.
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