Graduates 'forced into lower level jobs'

Years of study may not lead to high level careers

A report into the expansion of university education has warned that graduates are increasingly having to take jobs which do not require a degree.

It suggests the benefits of making further education available to more young people are not as clear cut as it was first thought.

The think tank, the Higher Education Policy Institute, says there is no real shortage of degree level skills in the UK.

Instead, it says the biggest skills shortage is for technical jobs and skilled trades.

Lower level jobs

The government's target of getting 50% of young people into university is one of the reasons for the controversial proposal to allow universities to charge students fees.

This report predicts there will be demand from students, who increasingly fear their prospects will be poor without a degree.

It actually gets harder for people to make careers if they don't do well in their early years of secondary school Professor Alison Wolfe

But it warns that graduates are already having to settle for lower level jobs than in the past.

It says many intermediate level jobs are recruiting graduates.

Yet these jobs require fewer degree level skills and pay a lower salary premium than the more traditional graduate occupations.

Professor Alison Wolfe from London University believes that encouraging more people into universities will cause problems.

She said: "Far from increasing opportunity and equalising opportunity, when you get to the levels of higher education that we've reached, you actually get a situation where... the major beneficiaries are the middle class.

"It actually gets harder for people to make careers if they don't do well in their early years of secondary school - it becomes much harder to come in by another route later.

"So I think we have got ourselves into a very difficult situation."

Fierce competition

The publication of the report follows news that the average level of graduate debt has risen by nearly a half over the past year.

A survey suggested the impact of tuition fees in England and Wales contributed to an average debt of £8,125 - an increase of £2,489, or 44%, over the past 12 months.

Last week university careers advisers warned students that they need to start planning their future jobs in the first year of their courses.

Thinking ahead would give students an advantage at a time when competition for jobs was fiercer than ever, said Margaret Dane, chief executive of the Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services said.