Just 6 Percent Of College Students Want To Work In Government: Poll

The public sector, the part of the economy experiencing cuts at every level, may soon be facing a staffing crisis of sorts.

Just 6 percent of students say they wanted to work for the government, whether at the federal, state or local level, according to the recently-published results of a survey conducted in early 2011 by the Partnership for Public Service. The Washington, D.C. -based nonprofit polled more than 35,000 students about their career aspirations and most said they were more interested in graduate school, non-profit work, employment in the private sector than government work.

The share of college students interested in working for the government has dropped two years in a row, getting smaller with every year of Barack Obama's presidency. In similar polls in 2009 and 2010, PPS found that 10.2 percent and 7.4 percent of college students, respectively, were interested in government work.

The PPS survey arrives at a moment when the public sector continues to struggle to hold onto its existing workforce. The recession pushed millions of Americans out of work, striking a severe blow to the government's tax intake and putting additional pressure on ballooning deficits at the local, state and federal levels.

As a result, some 700,000 government jobs were cut in the last three years. In 2011, public employees suffered more layoffs than any other group and federal payrolls are widely expected to keep shrinking through the year.

The ongoing attrition in the pubic sector might be one reason college students aren't more interested in government work. In the PPS survey, students were asked what qualities they considered most important for a first job. Job security came in second place, just behind "opportunities for personal growth."

Budget cuts have led officials to slash pay for government workers at the state and local levels, but fear of a reduced paycheck doesn't seem to be the principal reason for students' low interest in government work. Less than 9 percent of respondents in the PPS poll named a high starting salary as their main criteria for a first job.

It may simply be that with the unemployment rate finally beginning to deflate a bit, college students are more optimistic about finding private-sector jobs than they used to be. Students who graduated during the depths of the recession showed a greater likelihood to find work in government or public service than the graduates of just a few years before. Now, with hiring picking up, and almost a quarter of a million jobs created in the past month alone, students may have reason to feel more confident about finding work in the for-profit sector.

Also on HuffPost:

Comments

[Busterman]

04:56 PM on 02/09/2012

Goverment jobs are reserved for non-whites

[gurke75]

11:23 AM on 02/08/2012

I'm definitely a proponent of working for the government. With things being so uncertain in the world, I think one of the best ways to protect yourself is to be as financially diverse as possible, which translates to having a pension (in addition to other investing vehicles, like real estate, stocks, etc.). Sure, it's possible to get a pension in the private sector, but they're disappearing. Even in the government sector, waves are being made against pensions: ending them; reducing them; offering a hybrid pension/401K. Grab one while you can.

[Califishing]

03:42 PM on 02/08/2012

True....They don't have a clue...

[Marines1371]

10:47 AM on 02/08/2012

I have to say, as a loyal and proud Federal Employee, I know we need young talent in the Federal Workforce, but I would much rather hire a private sector employee that has a few years of experience, is tired of the rat race, being treated like dirt and is a hard worker.

The Governmentt should be run like a Fortune 500 or private sector entity, with different goals and business models obviously.... This is the job you get when you want to give back to your country.....

[Atwill]

11:20 AM on 02/11/2012

i agree. i am a state worker and would rather have a nurse, I am an RN, working with me with some time under their belt from a private hospital. i worked private for years before going to corrections.

[whosallen]

10:30 AM on 02/08/2012

"Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country?" Apparently not much interest from the college grads - that is sad.

[Bombastic1892]

09:36 AM on 02/08/2012

So this is the Republicans' fault? haha. Wow.

[Scurvydog74]

11:36 PM on 02/07/2012

If the repuds ever get back in the driver's seat it will all be privatized anyway. Bright young minds should stay away from the public sector jobs for now and in the forseable future because if the jobs are not eliminated they will be stripped of a large chunk of what pay and benefits they now offer.

[ahwhythehellnot]

11:13 PM on 02/07/2012

Would YOU want to work for this congress?

[madame48]

08:59 PM on 02/07/2012

Students also pay attention...they have heard the GOP slam and trash public employees like teachers, fire fighters, public health, even road crews. We have had a steady diet of " teachers are stealing your tax money" or remember Boehner explain that teachers negotiating was "holding a machine gun to the school board's head"....every week there is more bashing of the work public workers do...stuff that NEEDS to be done in a civilized country...from prison guards to teachers to DES scientists. I have had several students switch OUT of the teaching programs and a neighbor, halfway through an MAT program, quit, telling met ere was no way she could listen to that teacher bashing, and the efforts to bust the union....for what is a low professional wage...she took the LSAT and is now in law school instead of a classroom....young people will vote with their feet...eventually good luck finding that Calculus teacher

[Durrrrrr]

08:41 PM on 02/07/2012

"As a result, some 700,000 government jobs were cut in the last three years."

Only tell half the story. Ignore the fact that from 2000 to 2009 government jobs increased by over 2 million. Growing much more quickly than the total population.

[Felix13]

08:24 PM on 02/07/2012

We will see if they change their minds if they are unable to find a job in the private sector. Or their salary doesn't pay the bills.

[J R M]

08:22 PM on 02/07/2012

I am a highly educated computer security specialist. I am far less likely to work for the government directly than I am to work for the government via a contracting company. As a contractor I would be paid substantially more than as a civil servant, but have less security - the standard deal. The civil service tends to overpay lower skilled jobs and underpay highly skilled jobs. Hence a lot of highly skilled work is contracted out - which costs more than hiring the skilled staff and paying competitive wages.

[shortguy54]

05:35 AM on 02/08/2012

Smart comment, and good observation about the cost of outsourcing to contractors. Also, outsourcing government functions is not always healthy (see Blackwater). Maybe we need a honest public debate about government payscales?

[Num1Christy]

09:58 AM on 02/08/2012

Very accurate. My husband works for the gov't directly with contractors who get paid quite a bit more than himself. But like you said, job security isn't the best, as a contractor has no need to keep 'you' on if they can find someone who can do 'your' job for less. My husband has worked with a cycle of contractors over the last 3 years on the same project, which costs the gov't more money bc the project takes longer. In the end, I'll take the gov't income with the stability, insurance, and retirement plan.

[nelandquinten]

07:12 PM on 02/07/2012

This is serious! With fewer young students participating in government, the actions of our current government will last a long, long time. We need to out with the old, and in the new.

[gfe]

06:58 PM on 02/07/2012

thank goodness

[oldgeek1]

06:36 PM on 02/07/2012

Who wants to work where your efforts are unappreciated and always attacked for being over paid. Vest your time early on in the private sector where education is valued and your pay is judged based on other than the perception of people who get their news from Fox. In public service you are the target of every politician who wants to aspire to be in office.

[MeiLing]

06:07 PM on 02/07/2012

This isn't exactly news. When you're in college, reality hasn't struck yet and you think you're going to walk right out of college into a CEO position. They know that isn't going to happen in the public sector! Then reality strikes and changes everything!

[SuburbanMalcontent]

09:44 PM on 02/07/2012

Did you not read the article? The top two qualities college students are looking for are job security and personal growth, not salary. Nobody wants to work where you're denigrated as a leech on a daily basis in the halls of Congress and in the media. And then there's the uncertainty of it all, with every new Republican politician trying to pass more and more draconian budgets at the federal, state and local levels.

[Robert SF]

01:42 PM on 02/08/2012

I do think it's their naivete because they're not going to find job security nor personal growth in the private sector. And because they're young, they haven't thought about retirement. Social security is rarely more than $15k a year, and as the 401k figures show, it's a rare individual who has the discipline to save some money from every paycheck.