A local radio station is enticing its listeners with encouragement for its latest contest: “What will it take to stimulate your economy? A new television or maybe free gas for a year?”
Everywhere you turn, the buzz of recession is eminent.
Talk of an economic slump is all over news headlines; “jobs slashed” and “pointing to a recession” have become commonplace.
They’re not exactly encouraging words for college students and soon-to-be grads.
According to the Associated Press in Washington, about 80,000 jobs were cut in the month of March. The recession has caused a jump in unemployment rates, up from 4.8 to 5.1 percent over the same month.
Those with jobs heavily affected are in the construction, manufacturing, retail, financial services and other business service fields.
Housing market collapses, credit crunches and off-balance financial systems are the culprit in all of this mess, and the results – including an estimated 7.8 million unemployed, are only making the financial situation worse.
All of this might just seem like economic jargon, but it could have devastating effects for students entering the work force this year.
One USM student feeling the effects is Bethany Lynn, a 2007 graduate with a criminology degree.
She says she spends 45 minutes a day looking for jobs online, adding that the process “wasn’t what I expected.”
Her field has limited entry-level jobs available to graduates; most ask for a few years experience. It took Bethany two months to find a secure job in the field of social work, but she has had to find part-time jobs as a waitress and nanny just to pay the bills.
With budget cuts to the social work field in Maine, job openings are becoming even harder to come by.
“I’ve had to look into alternative fields, such as administrative and business positions,” she says. And most frustrating is that nothing seems to fit – she’s either over- or under-qualified for everything available.
With the healthcare industry booming, she’s decided to switch to a more profitable career in dentistry.
“I’m currently looking for something more stable,” she says. “I really wish that my professors had provided me with more career options, and were involved with my career placement. I don’t think I should have to seek them out.”
Bethany says she wishes her advisors had discussed long-term career planning. With Maine’s high unemployment rates, she has accepted that one day she will have to be willing to relocate.
On the brighter side, local economic expert, professor Charles Colgan of USM’s Muskie School of Public Service, offers some good news to the economic situation.
He believes that “the recession will end by next fall because the Fed has lowered interest rates, and Congress has passed the stimulus package.”
Colgan recognizes that it is a “little harder to find a job” in Maine, but not significantly so. There’s definitely a decline in employment, he says, but New England isn’t feeling the effects quite as hard as California or Florida.
On the topic of summer jobs, Professor Colgan stresses that the population in Maine increases by fifty percent during this period.
“It’s not difficult to find a summer job,” he says. “There’s a labor shortage in Maine anyways, and private sector jobs will help with this.”
Colgan also doesn’t think that this summer’s high gas prices will hamper tourism.
“This will only discourage long distance traveling, but encourage short term traveling,” he says.
This means that Maine might see more travelers from Massachusetts, as opposed to Michigan or Kansas.
However, he also recognizes that with prices forecasted for upwards of $4 per gallon this summer, “we don’t know what’s going to happen.”
Statistics show that most graduates end up getting a job 50-100 miles from where they graduated. With the economic slump, he says that most students will seek further education in their current field, but won’t change direction entirely.
One recent graduate not worried about her financial future is Kara Lee, who left USM in 2007 with degrees in business administration and marketing.
Kara was attended the USM’s annual job fair the month before graduation, and something lined up fairly quickly.
When asked about the economic slump, Kara isn’t too concerned.
“I’m going to stay in Maine for a few more years, but eventually I’ll move out of state, she says, “not because of the job crisis, but because of the weather.”