Today, college graduation lacks some of the promise it normally holds but some grads are taking the initiative and making it work. Photo: inorman88 (flickr)

You've probably heard something along the lines of "get an education and you'll make more money," at least once in your life.

And for the most part, it's true. Higher education and university degrees are linked to higher salaries, greater lifetime earnings, and lower unemployment rates. This correlation is corroborated by data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which shows that individuals who possess a doctoral degree faced an unemployment rate of a mere 2.5 percent in 2009, compared with an unemployment rate of 14.6 percent for those who did not finish high school.

Yet, the current job market is still tough for college graduates, and as a recent USA Today article reports, "the jobless rate for Americans with at least a bachelor's degree rose to 5.1 percent, the highest since 1970 when records were first kept." (This number has since declined. As of January 2011, the unemployment rate for those with a bachelor's degree or more is down to 4.2 percent according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics).

Still, employment prospects for many new college graduates are bleak. A press release from the National Association of Colleges and Employers describes the job situation for the class of 2010.

...[only] one-quarter (24.4 percent) of 2010 graduates who applied for a job actually have one waiting for them after graduation. In comparison, just 19.7 percent of 2009 graduates who applied for a job had one at this time last year.

This may be a consequence of older workers holding onto their jobs a little longer, postponing retirement in order to ensure they will have enough to live on after they leave the labor force, a recent The New York Times article asserts.

So what are young workers to do, when there just aren’t jobs opening up for them and the national unemployment rate hovers between 9 and 10 percent?

According to a different The New York Times article, some recent grads are making their own jobs, building businesses from scratch and employing themselves.

These young college graduates are trying something new, making up for their lack of experience with pluck and drive. The New York Times article mentions Scott Gerber, a young entrepreneur who opted to start his own company to "...encourage young people to start their own companies — instead of trying to land a job." His nonprofit is called the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC), and provides funding and mentorship to young entrepeneurs.

These desperate times call for creative measures. And who knows, maybe this new generation of entrepreneurs is just what we need to give our economy a push in the right direction.