Report 2008:35 R

Graduate entry to the employment market: 2005

Graduates in medicine and speech and language pathology had the highest employment rates: 90 per cent had entered employment within 1-1.5 years of graduation. Engineering, teaching and nursing graduates also had high employment rates: between 70 and 90 per cent.
 
Graduates in dentistry and in artistic fields were among those with the lowest employment rates: 31 per cent and 33 per cent respectively had entered employment within 1-1.5 years of graduation. Graduates in the humanities, social sciences and natural sciences had relatively low employment rates: between 40 and 60 per cent.

In comparison with figures from the previous year, the employment rates for graduates showed an improvement of approximately 2 per cent. This was a result of an improved employment market particularly within the private sector in the Stockholm region.

The previous years´ fall in employment rates for engineers, particularly for those specializing in information and communication technology, was replaced by a relatively strong rise in employment rates. Similar rises were noted for law graduates and students with one-year Masters degrees in economics. This was also true for graduates in architecture and engineers specialising in the built environment. However, there were falling employment rates for graduates in the care professions as well as for pharmacists and dispensers.

The employment rates were as expected. In general, the employment rates were higher for graduates from vocational and professional study programmes than graduates (Bachelor´s and one-year Master´s) in the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences and artistic fields.
 
The statistics from this study were provided by Statistiska centralbyrån (Statistics Sweden). Their registry includes information from Skatteverket (Swedish National Tax Board) about income, and from Arbetsmarknadsverket (Swedish Agency for Public Management) about unemployment rates and political initiatives for the employment market.

The report includes information about employment rates of certain categories of graduates and the higher education institutions (HEIs) where they studied. With regard to employment rates for engineers, there was no real difference in the employment rates of graduates from different HEIs. For other categories, there was a marked difference. This could just be a coincidence or be due to local employment conditions. It is also evident that it takes longer for graduates to enter employment if they are forced to move from the areas where they studied.

The employment rates for every HEI are presented in the report. It is clear that in recent years the employment rates for graduates from certain universities have remained the same. The highest rates can be found at the HEIs specialising in the care and teaching professions as well as HEIs with a more general range of courses and study programmes. Among the HEIs with the highest employment rates areÖrebroUniversity ,BoråsUniversityCollege , LinköpingUniversity and Jönköping University Foundation. Their good results, among other things, may be explained by their location in, or close to, relatively large local employment markets.