Recent graduates face tough job market despite pragmatic degree choices
Youth unemployment for bachelor's degree holders is at its highest since the early 1990s, with fewer job openings.
Unemployment among young Canadians with bachelor's degrees has reached its highest point since the early 1990s. For every job requiring a university degree, there are now 4.9 unemployed people. The time graduates spend looking for work has nearly doubled compared to last year. Job vacancies for degree holders have also fallen by six per cent in the past twelve months.
This struggle occurs even as graduates make more pragmatic educational choices than previous generations. The proportion of degrees awarded in the humanities has dropped from 13 per cent in the early 1990s to just five per cent today. Meanwhile, over the last three decades, fields like health sciences, engineering, business and computer science have grown to account for over 60 per cent of undergraduate degrees, up from 42 per cent. Politicians and commentators often criticize young people's choices. Ontario Premier Doug Ford told students concerned about OSAP cuts they're "picking basket-weaving courses and there's not too many baskets being sold out there." Mike Rowe, host of Dirty Jobs, said "we are lending money we don't have to kids who can't pay it back to train them for jobs that no longer exist."
Students now feel intense pressure to choose safe, career-focused paths from a young age. High school grades that once guaranteed university admission no longer do. Once enrolled, they select majors and courses seen as practical and likely to yield high marks, which limits their ability to explore different interests or take academic risks. This focus on safety may be misguided, according to Mike Moffatt of the Missing Middle Initiative. He argues that well-meaning advisors have pushed too many students into a narrow set of majors like business consulting and computer science. These fields are now among those most vulnerable to disruption from artificial intelligence. Moffatt says steering young people into a few supposedly safe careers increases their risk if demand for those jobs falls. He believes students should be encouraged to explore diverse options and take intellectual risks during their education.
With files from The Globe and Mail