Number of jobless college graduates hits record high

By Jung Sung-ki

The number of unemployed college graduates rose to an all-time high last year despite the faster-than-expected economic recovery, according to government data Tuesday.

This was due to the still-frozen labor market as well as the wide gap between employers’ demands and college graduates’ expectations for the level of their jobs, finance ministry officials said.

According to Statistics Korea, the number of jobless college graduates totaled 346,000 last year, the highest ever since the agency began compiling data on unemployment in 2000.

This represented a stark contrast to the decrease in the number of jobless people with lower education, which came down to 420,000 last year from 437,000 in 2009.

In 2000, the number of jobless college graduates was 230,000 and remained between 220,000 and 250,000 from 2001 to 2008 before spiking at 321,000 in 2009 in the wake of the global financial crisis.

“There is a structural problem in the job market, while college graduates are in favor of larger companies rather than smaller ones, the number of jobs available at the former is limited,” an official at the Ministry of Strategy and Finance said. “That’s why last year’s economic recovery failed to narrow these gaps between the job seekers’ hopes and reality.’’

Data show the number of jobs at public organizations or big corporations, which are favored by college graduates, decreased from 4.12 million in 1995 to 3.72 million in 2008. In contrast, the college entrance rate in the country saw a remarkable increase from 51.4 percent of high school graduates in 1995 to 83.8 percent in 2008.

By gender, jobless men with a bachelor’s degree or higher came to 204,000 last year, the highest figure since 2000, while the total of their female counterparts doubled to 142,000 from 73,000 in 2000, according to the data.

To solve these problems with the jobless growth among the well educated young, the government is seeking ways of restructuring college systems and improving job education programs for students.

“To promote the restructuring of college and universities, the government will encourage schools to make public the employment rate of their graduates, as well as support active merger and acquisitions of poorly managed schools,” the ministry official said.

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