3 Alternatives to Entry Level Jobs for Recent Grads
In a tough job market graduates need to be creative when it comes to finding ways to earn a living. In this article Maria Rainier shows you 3 ways recent grads can get ahead. ~Tim McMahon, editor
3 Alternatives to Entry Level Jobs for Recent Grads
By Maria Rainier
Today’s job market is enough to make even the most stoic and ascetic of philosophy majors fear for their quality of life. And the fact is, students are right to be worried. Economists are calling this the “Great Recession”, a label that the last four years certainly deserve — since 2007 unemployment levels have reached near record highs, almost as high as during the 1980′s recession, and though the situation has improved slightly, the outlook still isn’t great. Continue reading
Information about Bachelor of Commerce Degrees
Although many college graduates end up doing something entirely different than what they majored in, choosing the right degree is important to ensuring your future. Some majors like underwater basket weaving or psychology make it difficult to find jobs once you graduate. Today we are going to look at the Bachelor of Commerce Degree.
A Bachelor of Commerce is an undergraduate degree program in commerce and related subjects. The degree is also called the Bachelor of Commerce and Administration, or BCA. It is mainly offered in Commonwealth nations; however, the degree is no longer offered in the United Kingdom. Bachelor of Commerce is a well-liked degree in Canada, Europe and Australia for students eager to learn managerial skills to prepare them for the world of business after graduation. It’s comparable to a U.S. Bachelor of Business Management or Business Administration degree. The business knowledge they gain is comprised of accounting, law and marketing. While acquiring general business skills they specialize in one of the subjects the university offers in the program, such as economics, statistics or finance.
Internships Can Help
As a student or someone with limited job experience internships can be a wonderful way to gain experience and get your foot in the door even if you initially work for free. In medieval times finding a job was easier. If your father had a profession you were expected to take over the family business and go into that profession. However, if the family had too many sons or didn’t have a family profession the youngster (often at the age of 13 or younger) could become an apprentice to a professional in need of some help. The young apprentice would be given the most menial of tasks, starting with sweeping up the shop or doing other tasks that the “master” didn’t want to do. Then slowly he would be given increasing responsibilities until by the age of 18 he would be able to perform the vast majority of what the master could do. This system of training worked well and even Benjamin Franklin was an apprentice in a printing shop.
Today we send our children to school where hopefully they will learn to read and write and eventually get into college. Once they graduate they are on their own but depending on their major they may not have a single marketable skill. After all, how much demand is there for underwater basket weavers, or psychology majors? Even if you major in a profession like engineering or drafting where there is a defined job path it is often difficult to break in to the profession without any experience. And that is where internships come in. Continue reading
The Difference a Degree Makes in Unemployment Levels
We’re always told by our parents that we need a good education in order to get a good job. And that we will make more money if we have a good education. But these days we hear of unemployed college graduates camping out in New York city and protesting Wall Street because they can’t find jobs. So let’s take a look at the numbers and compare the unemployment rate based on eduation level. In the following chart we will look at four educational levels. The first level are those people with less than a High School education. The second level are those with a High School diploma. The third level are those with some college education or an associates degree. And finally those with a Four Year College Degree.
As we can see from the chart above, obviously the unemployment rate is the highest for those with the least education… as we would expect. Logically if you were an employer you would lay off the least educated employees first because they are more readily replaceable. We can even tell by the numbers the actual difference a high school education makes. The average unemployment rate for the period from 1992 through October 2011 for High School graduates was 5.5% while the average for those who didn’t graduate from High School was 9.2%. So simply by getting a High School education you decreased your odds of being unemployed drastically with the actual difference being 3.7%. But if you look at the chart you will see that a High School education was even more valuable than that. The real benefit of being able to get a job is when jobs are scarce, so even though the average difference was 3.7% during bad times, i.e. when the overall unemployment rate is higher the difference climbs even more.
First let’s look at the difference just a high School education makes. Continue reading
