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Women graduates are proving more successful at weathering the employment crisis than their male peers, new figures reveal today.
One in 10 men ¡ª or 10.3 per cent ¡ªwho graduated with a degree last summer is unemployed, compared with 6.5 per cent women not in work or studying for a further qualification.
Almost 10,000 male graduates failed to find work six months after leaving university, a 56 per cent rise on the previous year.
The Higher Education Statistics Agency analysis comes amid growing concern over soaring unemployment. Young people appear to be bearing the brunt of the downturn, with one in five 16- to 24-year old jobseekers now out of work. The agency figures also showed:
¡ö 73 per cent of women first degree graduates were in some form of employment after six months, compared with 68 per cent of men.
¡ö Men were slightly more likely to be in further study than women.
¡ö 9,530 men who graduated last year were unemployed six months after leaving university, compared with 6,125 a year earlier.
¡ö One third of graduates were working in non-graduate jobs, such as in restaurants, shops or factories.
This summer¡¯s final year students have been told to work for nothing or take bar or supermarket jobs as leading firms cut back on graduate recruitment. The National Union of Students has warned that the class of 2009 faces an employment crisis.
Higher education minister David Lammy insisted: ¡°Employment rates for both male and female graduates continue to be higher than for those with lower qualifications. We are putting in place a range of options for graduates, such as the Graduate Talent Pool created to help match motivated students with firms offering internships.¡±
But shadow universities secretary David Willetts said: ¡°The Government didn¡¯t use the boom years to prepare the country for tougher economic times and now Britain¡¯s young people, and young men in particular, are paying the price.¡±
