The Career Effects of Graduating During a Recession

I stumbled upon an interesting article that will probably interest many people of my age, since we are about to enter the job market. This article is from the National Bureau of Economic Research and the study is done on Canadian students. The highlight of the article is the point where it stated that young college graduates would experience about a 30 to 40 percent initial wage loss from starting a career in a recession.

Oh… the effects supposedly does not end just at the early career stage too… it could drag on for years and not disappear until after ten years. You can read up more here: http://www.nber.org/digest/nov06/w12159.html

I am unsure the means of comparison, but there has been few recessions that can match the current one. Therefore, I would venture to say that recent graduates will be much more heavily affected than the article suggest. Already, if you are looking for jobs, you can see some jobs offering not even 2k for a fresh graduate. It is a salary that few would accept, yet university graduates are not able to get jobs as easily as just a year before and not accepting a low pay could mean going down the path of unemployment.

However, I do see something positive coming out of this job market crisis. Just a year or two years ago, people were pretty nonchalant in their job search, because they know that they can easily get a job. Now, job searchers are becoming increasingly proactive and the long application forms that each take two hours to complete are no effective in stopping people from submitting hundreds of applications. Yes, I know of people that have sent hundreds of applications and still sending.

At a certain stage, people are starting to feel that they are not able to get a job and their survival instincts awaken. They stop thinking of searching for jobs, but rather, start thinking of whether there is another way to get what they truly need and for most, it’s the money and not the job. Of course, most people would say that you should find a job that you love and not work for money. However, it’s time to be realistic and know that you can have the most passion for something, but ultimately, the current job market does not offer much choices even for truly passionate people. I do have a few friends who got great jobs though, so there is nothing stopping job hunters from continuing their search.

It seems like the only true way to pursue your passion now is to start something yourself. I don’t say that because I support entrepreneurship, since I think entrepreneurship is a truly tough path compared to working for others. I am saying that because a lot of my friends had suddenly start thinking of other ways to make money such as giving tuition, starting a business or trying to sell things. I think this is quite encouraging, since they could have easily resigned to fate and rot at home, cursing their fates for graduating during this time.

For those who intend to venture out on their own, it may result in something big after a few years, but the start of a journey is always the toughest.
For those who intend to look for jobs, sending in hundreds of applications may not be the norm anymore, try thousands.

No matter which path is chosen, I wish you all the best. Oh, ‘you’ includes me. I wish myself all the best as well.