Survey lays bare European graduates' hopes and fears

By Ami Sedghi. Graduates in Europe now expect to submit as many as 60 applications before landing their first job, and the average wait between graduation and employment is approaching six months. More than half of European graduates are worried about their careers, a rate that rises to more than 80% in Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain according to Europe's largest graduate survey. The survey, conducted by the trendence institute in Berlin, builds up a picture of an educated European youth firing off scores of applications in vain, waiting months for their first job, and increasingly prepared to take on unpaid internships to get a foot on the ladder — or else emigrate. It may come as no surprise that in Greece — where the youth unemployment rate reached 62.5% earlier this year — more than 90% of business graduates are worried about their future career. Read more...