53 Percent Of All Young College Graduates In America Are Either Unemployed Or Underemployed.

By intothevoid, on April 23rd, 2012

If you are in college right now, you will most likely either be unemployed or working a job that only requires a high school degree when you graduate. The truth is that the U.S. economy is not coming anywhere close to producing enough jobs for the hordes of new college graduates that are entering the workforce every year.

In 2011, 53 percent of all Americans with a bachelor’s degree under the age of 25 were either unemployed or underemployed. Millions upon millions of young college graduates feel like the system has totally failed them. They worked hard in school all their lives, they went into huge amounts of debt in order to get the college education that they were told they “must have” in order to get a good job, but after graduation they found that there were only a handful of good jobs for the huge waves of college graduates that were entering the “real world”. All over America, college graduates can be found waiting tables, flipping burgers and working behind the register at retail stores. Unfortunately, the employment picture in America is not going to get significantly better any time soon.

All over the United States, “middle class jobs” are being replaced by “low income jobs” and young college graduates are being hurt by this transition more than almost anyone else. Massive numbers of young college graduates are now working jobs that do not even require a high school degree. Some of the statistics about young college graduates are absolutely astounding. The following is from a recent CNBC article….

In the last year, they were more likely to be employed as waiters, waitresses, bartenders and food-service helpers than as engineers, physicists, chemists and mathematicians combined (100,000 versus 90,000). There were more working in office-related jobs such as receptionist or payroll clerk than in all computer professional jobs (163,000 versus 100,000). More also were employed as cashiers, retail clerks and customer representatives than engineers (125,000 versus 80,000).

Can you imagine working really hard all throughout high school and college and always getting good grades and then ending up as a bartender?

read more at: http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/53-percent-of-all-young-college-graduates-in-america-are-either-unemployed-or-underemployed

Economic Collapse, Societal Collapse

7 comments to 53 Percent Of All Young College Graduates In America Are Either Unemployed Or Underemployed.

• Rainmaker

  April 23, 2012 at 1:15 pm · Reply

  Intothevoid – not sure what to make of the post. I guess if you are contemplating college for an education thas one thing, but for gainful employment after college, thats another. It is one of the memes that evolved via our social constructs over the last 50 years, everyone is supposed to go to college. Its like an extension of public education, indoctrination into early adulthood.

  College is not all that is cracked up to be, at least not in the modern variety. Furthermore, the product of many of our college and universities is not that great, sorry to say.

  One of our biggest failures socially, is that we teach no one to be entreprenuers. Young poeple, generally, all are looking for jobs, and few want to take risk to open their own businesses or work for themselves. Not all, but less than in previous generations. If only 10% of those with college educations instead of spending money on tuition and other college related expenses, used those monies to start businesses of their own, endeavors of their own, we would have a completely different financial picture today than what we have. Many would have failed and many would have succeeded. Most that failed would have tried again and ultimately succeeded.

  Everyone wants a job after college working for the man. I never went to college and I know I missed out on alot. But what I gained in place was invaluable.

  I guess what I am saying is that we don’t teach our young people how to be producers. Certainly not savers. Thats what we need more of. Thats what will be the most rewarding. Thats whats missing. Instead, we teach our young people, to a certain extent, to be obstructionists to production and saving. Unfortunatley, thats counterproductive to sound economic theory.

• intothevoid

  April 23, 2012 at 3:57 pm · Reply

  yeah, i just seen the article and figured it might have some value to some of the younger readers here at the site and threw it up on the board.

  and just to throw it out there, i already went to school, paid my loan off and received an associate’s degree. so no, i’m not particularly thinking of attending college for a career advancement.

  i would rather learn another trade to add to the ones i already have, than to go into debt again for another piece of paper. it would be nice to see more ‘on-the-job’ apprenticeships available, rather than internships and non-paid training.

  i agree on the entrepreneur aspect. if kids were to take the money spent on education and start their own ventures, things could possibly be better than what they are now. they could run their own business, provide jobs and become self-sufficient. but as we know, TPTB don’t want that… they want debt slaves.

  from what i’ve gathered besides the fact of a dollar collapse, there have also been a lot of new regulations, tax codes, globalization and monopolization of markets that have decimated, if not eradicated, small business ventures in certain areas of this country.

  with no true free market, you have the ‘Too Big To Fail’ companies getting bailed out and some ‘mom and pop’ joints for example, struggling to get by or compete with ‘big box store prices’ or get swallowed up the minute they default or fall behind financially in consolidations/buyouts by those same TBTF’s.

  and america as a whole, do we really produce anything anymore? i know we like to export war and debt. i mean, how often do you see ‘made in the u.s.a’ label on products nowadays? from what i’ve seen, it’s extremely few and far between and when you do see it, it costs significantly more than the cost china could produce it for.

  and as far as teaching the youth to be ‘savers’… i would like to say it’s somewhat hard to do when there are no jobs to earn enough money to save. the inflation rates prevent any chance to set aside for savings and for some of the youth who do have jobs, they spend every penny they get to squeak by and manage an ‘adult’ existence.

  ‘adult’ meaning they have a small place of their own, means of transportation, feed and clothe themselves, and pay their bills. and with stagnant wages, inflated cost of goods, student loan debt and the ‘belief in the matrix’ for those still asleep, it’s a no wonder why most of them are not able to save any money.

  and we as a society have been brainwashed to only ‘consume’, to keep buying the latest and greatest fad or electronic device or to keep up with the ‘joneses’… better yet, let me update that for the current social view: to keep up with the ‘kardashians’. that goes for everyone i suppose, not just the youth.

  another aspect that i have seen is more jobs are requiring some type of certification or degree, hence why people try to go to school and have the expectation of a job. it’s no longer a scenarion where a walk-in off the street can come in, prove themselves and work his/her way up the ladder. they have to know someone or hold a degree nowadays.

  and when they can’t find a job or don’t have enough experience, they are advised to go back to school and expand on their field or pursue another degree, keeping the debt-cycle intact and the youth out of the job market or in customer-service related industries.

  from my own personal perspective, you would figure 7 years of operating heavy equipment would be sufficient experience, but most jobs that i have looked at in the last year are requiring certain types of certification as a pre-requisite.

  the impression i get is: fuck how good i am and how many years i have under my belt or what letter of recommendations i have, i’m basically not shit without that piece of paper that says so.

  these certifications involve adequate amounts of time and resources to obtain. just for a piece of paper that says i’m nationally qualified/recognized to operate specific pieces of equipment… so you are now legally able to hire me. one particular training facility’s fees ranged from a couple grand to upwards of $20,000 or more depending on the amount of equipment you wanted to be certified in.

  and then what, hypothetically speaking… i get another job operating heavy equipment and spend the next 5-10 years paying that debt off for the certification that the job required and hopefully manage to score a studio apartment and eat ramen noodles or pbj’s for the time being, until i can save enough money to start my own business.

  and let’s hope that my car doesn’t break down or require a major repair or that i would need a minor medical operation as that would wipe out my 2-3 month emergency fund and leave me close to living down by the river in a van or the equally disheartening choice to swallow my pride and head back to ma’s house.

  and that’s assuming she chose to let me in or hasn’t run into financial problems or gone into foreclosure herself. i know of some parents who don’t care about their adult children as they are supposedly ‘grown up’ and it’s their problem now. the parents have their own issues to deal with and a young adult in their 20’s or 30’should be able to ‘make it’, no excuses… cuz their parents were able to. the problem is, it’s a lot different now than back in the day.

  but i’m not attacking you, just thinking out loud… and i hear you loud and clear and can definitely agree with you. we do need more producers and savers and more people who are self-sufficient in their own rights. i just don’t know how easy it is to assume it will happen within this current system.

• Ant

  April 23, 2012 at 4:50 pm · Reply

  I think the Internet is making many degrees obsolete – you can learn almost anything you want if you can ask good questions.

  In my opinion our society would benefit by going back to a apprenticeship based society. After a apprenticeship program then go to college if you still want. Experience gives perspective, not so much college, at least the way it is being taught. Don’t you think working for an engineer, architect, lawyer, or hospital before going to college would benefit universities, employers and job seekers? This of course assumes universities survive the next economic transformation.

  • intothevoid

    April 23, 2012 at 5:06 pm · Reply

    good points.

    • Rainmaker

      April 23, 2012 at 6:34 pm · Reply

      You have your head on straight, but you are still using some of the logic from the old paradigm. If you could be a heavy equipment operater to pay off debt for the next 5-10 years, that would be very cool, just to have the work.

      Keep your head up, look sharp, and get positive. Things do suck, no doubt about that. Life is hard, always has been. Gonna be something different, most of us cannot imagine what it will be like. But one thing for certain, you’re IT. As I say to many of the young folks who get it (there aren’t many, but youn are coming around), those that get handed this giant shit sandwich, its your day, your future, good or bad, so make the most out it. Whether you realize it or not, “you’re THE Shit”. Whether you like it or not, you’re “it”. History is going down on you’re watch even if you did not choose it. Stand tall. Its OK to be angry, but you have to get over it. Be strong, Be honest, be fair. Above all, be proud. When this is all said and done, your generation, and the one that comes next, will be the ones that saved humanity from evil.

• Rojelio

  April 24, 2012 at 1:26 am · Reply

  Universities have been around for centuries and I would hope that they continue in some form. Minus the moneylenders of course.

  Certain fields of study are best be taught at a university. Petroleum geology, molecular biology, chemistry in a real laboratory, fox examples. You want your thoracic surgeon to be university trained, right?

  It’s probably too late, but here’s some starter ideas:

  1. Throw out the moneylenders. When loans weren’t the norm, tuition was affordable.
  2. Quit whining if you took $30,000 of loans for some kind of humanities bullshit degree.
  3. Get rid of the football and the 8,000 other sports that have to be funded in various ways, including expansion of student debt. Nothing against football, but don’t use student debt to pay for it.
  4. Unless you’re an agricultural school, lose all that unnecessary real estate with giant lawns the size of city blocks everywhere.
  5. Enough with the textbook scam where kids have to spend huge sums of money on new textbooks literally every semester.
  6. The tenure system had its day, but now its a giant welfare system for lame-ass overpaid professors that need to get the boot.
  7. Make it more skill-focused. Also what law says it has to take 4 years minimum? That seems outdated in today’s fast pace. Lose all the unnecessary fluff elective shit. You can learn A LOT in let’s say 1 year if done properly.
  8. Fire all the economics professors and replace them with teachers who do not take Paul Krugman seriously.

  • Dana Meador

    April 25, 2012 at 9:15 pm · Reply

    Excellent propositions!