The lives of the growing number of students, who are struggling to find work may well be scarred as the recession pulls them back from being able to pay off their student debt anytime soon. Despite the Student Loan Company recently announcing its 0 per cent on interest rates for the loans from September this year, students are expected to suffer from big downturns of their own for years after the recession is over. Unemployment rates soar The number of Brits under the age of 25 who are claiming jobseeker’s allowance has risen by over 200,000 over the past year, with figures reaching a to around 456,000, according to government figures. Brendan Barber, the TUC general secretary, said: “Youth unemployment is at its highest rate for 15 years. Unemployment leaves a permanent scar on young people’s lives and the government must do all it can to stop joblessness blighting another generation.” According to the labour market economist, David Blanchflower, unemployment, “is going to be the biggest issue in the next election.” He stated that unemployment will have a “scarring” effect on the lives of many students. “The danger is that we have a lost generation,” he said. Gerwyn Davies, a public policy adviser at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, (CIPD) stated that today’s generation of students are facing the worst unemployment situation compared to what any generation has faced in decades. And to add to this stark announcement, Mr Davies believes that it will get worse. He said: “We already have a situation where one in six young people are unemployed. Unfortunately, this situation is going to worsen.” However, the worst sufferers are the graduates of 2009. The ‘generation crunch’ According to the president of the National Union of Students, (NUS), Wes Streeting, not only are these graduates of 2009 the first to pay tuition fees of at least £3,000 a year, but they will also be “graduating into the worst labour market for a very long time.” He labelled the Class of 2009, the “generation crunch and said: “The government needs to look again at the situation facing graduates and what they can do proactively to ensure they are not sitting around becoming depressed and disgruntled because they’re unable to get a job.” And by not being able to get a job, these graduates will struggle to cope with paying off their student loans, credit card debts and any other financial obligations that they may have landed themselves into. Tom Spencer, the president of the Stirling University Student’s Association said: “Students were promised that if they went to university they would get a good job and earn more money. “They were told that they should take on the burden of student debt because they would benefit in the long term. “For the class of 2009 this is not the case, unemployment rates for young people are soaring, before students even graduate. “The jobs they will go into, if they find jobs at all, will not be the well paid graduate jobs they were promised and further study is only an option for those who can afford it.”
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