After four years of college, many graduates are ending up in jobs that
only require the ability to operate a cash register with a smile.
After commencement, a growing number young people say they have no
choice but to take low-skilled jobs, according to a survey released this
week. And while 63% of “Generation Y” workers — those age 18 to 29 —
have a bachelor’s degree, the majority of the jobs taken by graduates
don’t require one, according to an online survey of 500,000 young
workers carried out between July 2011 and July 2012 by PayScale.com, a
company that collects data on salaries.
Another
survey
by Rutgers University came to the same conclusion: Half of graduates in
the past five years say their jobs didn’t require a four-year degree
and only 20% said their first job was on their career path. “Our
society’s most talented people are unable to find a job that gives them a
decent income,” says Cliff Zukin, a professor of political science and
public policy at Rutgers.
The jobs that once went to recent college graduates are now more often
going to older Americans. Over the past year, workers over 55 accounted
for 58% of employment growth, says Dean Baker, a co-director of the
Center for Economic and Policy Research, a nonprofit think tank in
Washington, D.C. Why? Employers think older workers are a safer bet and
more likely to stay, he says. Unemployment hovered at 6.2% in July for
workers over 55, according to the Labor Department, but was more than
double that rate — 12.7% — for those ages 18 to 29.
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