UK / More than 20,000 of last year’s graduates were unemployed six months after leaving university

More than 20,000 of last year’s graduates were unemployed six months after leaving university, with men more likely to be out of work than women.

Thousands more took jobs that do not require a degree such as window cleaners, office juniors and road sweepers.

Overall, nine per cent of all UK and EU full-time university leavers, or 20,415, were assumed unemployed after completing a first degree in 2011-12, according to figures yesterday from the Higher Education Statistics Agency. Women are faring better than men in the job market, the data suggested, with more than one in 10 − or 11 per cent — of male graduates whose whereabouts were known six months after they finished their first degree registered as jobless, compared with seven per cent of women.

Although the total proportion of those unemployed six months after graduation is the same as the previous year, the agency warned that figures are not directly comparable because of changes in the way they are collected.

The statistics also looked at the types of jobs and careers graduates were in after gaining their degree. In 2011-12 more than a third of new graduates working in the UK were in “non-professional” jobs not necessarily requiring a degree.

Around 9,695 people were working in “elementary occupations”, taking jobs as office juniors, hospital porters, waiters, road sweepers, window cleaners, shelf stackers and lollipop men and women.

Chosen excerpts by Job Market Monitor

via Graduates taking elementary jobs – Telegraph.