Author: Donovan Dennis
Headlines fumed over the slowing job creation rate after the Bureau of Labor and Statistics (BLS) released the March 2013 jobs report, and political pundits spun the news every which way. Optimists expected 192,000 jobs to be created in March, but the stunted economy only produced 88,000.
There are several hypotheses attempting to explain the slowed job creation rate. One of the theories gaining considerable clout among economists recognizes the effects of Hurricane Sandy and other major winter weather events on the Eastern seaboard. Atypical weather episodes caused mass destruction in many communities, thus rebuilding efforts and emergency crews were organized and hired to manage clean up and reconstruction, which facilitated an inflation in the jobs creation rate during the recovery months.
Home improvement sales surged during the fourth quarter of 2012 and, consequently, many workers were hired to assist in sales, as well as to complete the actual construction within the communities. As construction and sales draw to a close, many are now out of work and looking for new employment, leaving the unemployment rate relatively high compared to the state of the economy.
Nonetheless, Occidental and other college students across the country should not dwell on the latest jobs report when looking for post-college employment: college students are employed, and they do not want the 104,000 jobs – mostly base-level jobs – that were not created. Appropriately, most students after college strive for a career in knowledge-based industries, rather than the service and manufacturing sectors.
It’s true that on the larger scale we should see the rate of job creation as a measure of our economy’s vigor and health, and sluggish numbers should be improved. However, equipped with the skills necessary for a competitive jobs market, college graduates often have a much easier search finding jobs and make more money than those without degrees.
The BLS numbers also included employment statistics for adults over the age of 25 with bachelor’s degrees compared to their counterparts with lower levels of education. While the unemployment rate for those without a high school diploma raised eyebrows at the 11.1 percent in March, the unemployment rate for adult college graduates over the age of 25 was considerably lower, dropping to 3.8 percent. Taking into consideration the natural rate of unemployment, the job search for those entering the workforce with bachelor’s degrees should be significantly easier than for those without. Although overall unemployment might be high and jobs a little harder to come by, youth employment isn’t in jeopardy.
Many jobs that are created specifically work to recent college graduates’ benefit. Companies that recently laid off longtime, often expensive, employees, are now seeking their replacements, and they are recruiting younger (less expensive) employees to fill out vacant positions. In other words, veteran employees looking for middle or upper management positions have a much more difficult time finding employment than fresh-from-campus graduates seeking vacancies in entry-level positions.
According to the BLS, the current occupations with the largest jobs growth will be in the health and assistive services field as the baby boom generation ages. For those students choosing to enter health services fields, the opportunities for employment will expand rapidly, approximately 34.5 percent by 2020 in health support occupations and 24.9 percent for healthcare practitioners and technical occupations, significantly more than any other occupational group.
At the end of the day, while high unemployment rates are never a good thing, college graduates need not worry. Job opportunities for graduates, although perhaps not abundant, are available, and employers will always hire apt and capable applicants.
Donovan Dennis is a first-year history major. He can be reached at dennisd@oxy.edu.
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