Degrees of precariousness: The problematic transition into the labour market of Greek higher education graduates

This paper discusses the transition into the labour market among higher education graduates from 2000 to date. It identifies a number of trends. First, this transition is protracted and not completed for the majority of Greek graduates until their thirties. Second, the labour market is fragmented along education level, place of living (urban or non-urban), gender, age and ethnic lines. Third, higher education does not seem to play a socially integrative role, as it does not shield against unemployment, emigration and precariousness. Fourth, the economic crisis has exacerbated endur­ing problems integral to the labour market and its weak connections with higher education. The multiple and overlapping problems underlying the transition from higher education to the labour market is at the crux of the economic and political problems Greece is facing and they point to a ticking bomb at the foundations of the Greek society.