Depressed

You are just in 2nd yr. All this recession and layoffs will be long gone by the time you graduate. Just focus on preparing well for interviews and gain some internship experience. Try for some open source experience as well. Don't worry.

There is no dearth of jobs for PPL who excel at what they do.

Skills you learn won't go waste anytime.Maybe try building apps for problems around you. Only thing we can do is try, outcome we should not expect.

You have a long way to go, don't worry about all this uncertainty. Keep building, keep learning, you will end up in good places eventually.

Online media focused more on doom and gloom. It's not like that everywhere. Granted economy is down, it will eventually bounce back up. Also I know several folks comfortably making 70L+ in this economy. It's not as bad as you see on these sites.

Really!!! You are depressed at your second year of college??? You are too late bro, I was depressed when I joined my kinder garden itself.
Better drop out of your college and start a tea shop or pano puri stall near some office or college. 🤑💰

When I was in 2nd year, I was just thinking of how to pass the semester subjects, and how to enjoy college life (dreaming of crushes, movies, going places around). In our times too, there was 2008 recession (our seniors must have faced the brunt), but we had hardly bothered. So you seem to have just a pessimistic approach. Or you are spending too much time among wrong people, and reading wrong type of social media posts. Get away from all of that. Focus on your college life.

You are best placed to enjoy the fruits of a good market when the tide turns. See where the market is going to be in 2 yrs, that'll matter to you.

Stop overthinking

Engineering has become like a springboard for starting your career. An engineering degree by itself will just enable you to get access to jobs. A better college will increase that access much more significantly. But you gotta build your skill set in any job/domain you choose. That will define how employable you are. If you are good at what you do and a problem solver, you will have no dearth of opportunities. I strongly feel we are entering a new era of employment where your educational pedigree/ college might just not be sufficient to guarantee any employment, you will have to prove what value you can bring.