One million graduates face unemployment

Despite the fact that the receession has dominated the news this year, the impact on students remained largely unknown; but last week it was revealed that around 40,000 graduates in Britain will still be attempting to find work in six months time.

It is becoming clear that the fight amongst recently graduated students for jobs will be tougher than ever, and it is predicted by education and economic experts that the number of under-25s who are not in employment could easily rise to over the one million mark if this trend continues.

If this particular credit crunch follows the economic pattern of the last recession, this number is expected to be double the amount of members from the ‘Class of 2008’ who were out of employment or not in further education half a year after their degrees had finished.

In terms of Warwick students, however, the issues concerning this year’s vast number of graduate job market problems has – according to the UK Graduate Careers Survey 2009, not phased finalists at the University.

96 per cent of students feel that their time here has definitely been worthwhile and that they would not hesitate in recommending Warwick to other prospective students.

The University has a reputation for graduates who choose to go into the economic and financial sector with the vast majority of graduating students opting to go into accountancy, management consulting, investment banking, teaching (which, for the first time is the most popular graduate career destination nationally) and, to a lesser extent, the media.

However, the fact the Careers Survey discovered a “dramatic fall” in applicants for jobs in finance and banking does not bode well for the ‘typical’ Warwick graduate.

The Warwick-specific discoveries of the survey found that “40 per cent of finalists at the University of Warwick expect to join the graduate job market at the end of their studies, 27 per cent plan to study for a postgraduate course, 8 per cent expect to take temporary work, 15 per cent are preparing to take time off or go travelling and 10 per cent are undecided about what to do after university.”

This is a definite drop in the number of students choosing to go straight into the workforce and the 27 per cent of Warwick graduates who are choosing to continue their studies suggest that young people are increasingly choosing to stay at university and gain more skills to add to their employability during the recession.

However, graduates from this University who do choose to go straight in to a graduate job are somewhat better off than the rest of the country.

Whilst the average starting salary is £22,300, a Warwick student can expect to earn around £24,200 when they start their first job. The vast majority of Warwick graduates also choose to work in London and the Midlands.

Students at the start of their careers can be expected to have more debt than ever before and will, according to the survey, “owe an average of £15,700, up more than a third from the average debt of £11,600 in 2008, largely because of the introduction of higher tuition fees for undergraduates at English universities in 2006.”

In the credit crunch, this will make life even more difficult financially for new workers and so it appears that the desperation for any job – whether in the field of the students’ particular preference or not – is constantly growing.

According to the Graduate Careers Survey’s findings, “A third of finalists looking for work said that, in the current economic climate, they would have to accept any job they were offered.

A sixth admitted that the scarcity of graduate jobs has meant they’ve had to apply to employers that they weren’t really interested in.”

This comes despite the best efforts of Careers Advisors at Universities all around the country – 84 per cent of finalist students have been using their services in a bid to gain employment.

However, even if a job is secured, around 42 per cent of graduates fear that the offer of work could easily be cancelled before the start of their contract.

Similarly, it is a frequent occurrence for young workers with low salaries to be made redundant within their first year of work, if the company needs to cut back on employees.

Despite all these concerning facts, the vast majority of students from Warwick this year – the Class of 2009 – do not regret their decision to come to the University.

According to the Graduate Careers Survey, “94 per cent of finalists felt that attending the University of Warwick would help them get a good job after university.” Whether this positivity is misplaced or not remains to be seen.