This Common Post-Grad Career Move Will Actually Hurt You, According to New Study

This Common Post-Grad Career Move Will Actually Hurt You, According to New Study Todays college graduates are facing a new conundrum More people than ever are earning degrees, but many of them arent using their (very expensive) educations.Instead of applying for jobs that require a college education, many graduates are taking jobs that dont right out of school, like bartending, driving for a ride-share app, or working at a coffee shop.Burning Glass Technologies, a job market analytics firm, and nonprofit Strada Institute for the Future of Workset out to answer just how harmful this decision is for new graduates.In order to understand howunderemploymentis affecting the most recent generation, they studied 4 million college graduates in the United States.They found that four in 10 new grads are currently underemployed.Overall, graduates who initially find themselves underemployed are five times mora likely to be underemployed in the future, compared to those who take a job requiring th eir degree right out of college. And of those underemployed grads, two-thirds will be working the exact same job in five years.Underemployment hits especially hard for women. More women than men start their post-grad lives underemployed (47 percent compared to 37 percent, respectively) and women are mora likely than men to stay underemployed in the future.This gender gap persists over time and holds true across every college major except engineering, the researchers wrote.Even in STEM fields like mathematics and engineering, which are traditionally perceived as reliable majors with lots of job availability, women are more likely to leave college and enter a job where they are underemployed.Why?According to the CEO of Burning Glass, Matt Sigelman, there are two possible reasons.First, female STEM students may not have the same mentor influence and opportunities as male STEM students.Avoiding underemployment after college takes a conscious strategy, he said. A strategy that female stu dents may not even be aware is necessary.Men may have stronger professional networks right out of school than women do, he continued.And, according to Sigelman, men are more likely to apply for jobs that may be above them, requiring higher skill level or more experience than they actually have.A man who has a few of the requirements, but not all, is likely to apply anyway, with the idea that he can learn on the job, he said. But women more often think theyre underqualified if they dont meet all the criteria. So they dont apply.Regardless of gender, underemployment is expensive. College graduates aged 22 to 27 working at a job that did not require their college degree earn $10,000 less each year than graduates who took jobs that require a degree.According to Sigelmanm, the rise in underemployment could be linked to a big shift among students in recent years away from the humanities into majors that sound more practical, but really arent. As well as youll figure it out later attitudes many colleges adopt when it comes to curriculum universities arent teaching the skills most employers are searching for in their job applications.Most students dont start to focus on what employers want until theyre well into their senior year, which is way too late.