Spanish graduates trail in job-hunt race

11 December 2003

GRANADA – Spanish graduates are the slowest in Europe to find jobs, a survey found Thursday.

On average it takes them more than 11 months to get employment after university.

The European average is almost half this time — just over six months.

The survey was compiled by the universities of Granada and Kassel in Germany to look at the pattern of employment for recent graduates.

Nearly a fifth of Spanish graduates (18 percent) take four years to find a job after completing their degrees.

In comparison, on average, only five percent of graduates across Europe are still out of work after four years.

After Spain, new graduates in Italy took the longest time to find employment.

Ulrich Teichler, professor of the university of Kassel, in Germany, and director of the European Center of Investigation about Higher Eductaion and Employment, studied 12 countries across Europe.

Prof Teichler analysed the transition period between the date of the degree and when graduates found their first jobs.

The study found that Spanish graduates showed a marked contrast with their counterparts in northern European countries, like Germany, where nearly 50 percent find a job immediately after taking their degrees.

In these countries, 80 percent of the graduates find their first jobs only three months after completing their studies.

The study said Spain and France had the worst record for graduates failing to find work up to six months after leaving university.

In Spain, 41 percent were still out of work and in France 34 percent were still job-hunting.

In the European Union the average level of unemployment for people under 29 years was 11,9 per cent.

But in Spain the figure was three times as high, at 33 percent.

The study said there was “a relative excess of university students in Spain with respect to other similar countries”.

It blamed central and regional governments for creating too many university places.

[Copyright EFE with Expatica]

Subject: Spanish news