MSU Career Services Network and MonsterTRAK — job site Monster.com’s college-focused branch — released a survey last week detailing hiring rates of potential employers. Larger companies — ones with more than 55 employees — plan to decrease total hiring by about 8 percent in 2009.

“The job market is being pounded and the college labor market is no exception,” said Phil Gardner, director of the Collegiate Employment Research Institute.

“We see hiring down this year. If a student is going out in December and hasn’t done a lot of preparation to find a job, or hasn’t worked with career services, they’re going to have a very difficult time.”

Post-graduation concerns

Although 2009 will be the first year of President-elect Barack Obama’s presidency, financial experts aren’t expecting change in the economy’s current climate. The Research Seminar in Quantitative Economics, an economic forecast group based at the University of Michigan, predicted in its Nov. 21 forecast that more than 100,000 jobs will be cut in the state next year.

“It’s even more challenging in Michigan and all you have to do is look outside,” said Doug Roberts, the director of the Institute for Public Policy and Social Research at MSU.

“Mom and Dad might want you to stay home and you might say ‘OK, but which one of you is going to employ me?’ It’s a very different time. Given the issue we’re having now with the autos, until some of this stuff settles down, Michigan is going to continue to go through some difficult times.”

With Michigan facing one of the most difficult economic situations in the country, some MSU seniors know their futures after graduation will be outside the Mitten State.

Kristen Nilo, an elementary education senior graduating in the spring, said although she’s going to be starting an internship after graduation, she won’t be doing so in the state. Nilo said Michigan’s dwindling employment rate has added stress to her final year in East Lansing.

“It’s a lot of stress on my shoulders whether or not I’ll have a job,” she said. “(I don’t know) whether I’m going to stay in Michigan or if I’ll have to go out of state, which is probably the case. I have to go to Chicago for my internship because I know that even if I do my internship in Michigan, I’m not going to get my job in Michigan.”

While the economic forecast for 2009 doesn’t start to brighten until late in the year, Roberts said forecasts can be wrong.

“The only thing you can hope for is in some other areas, it may be a little brighter,” he said. “We can also hope that things turn around a little bit quicker than we expect.”

Statewide turmoil

Michigan’s biggest unemployment pitfall in 16 years is leaving recent graduates in a flux as businesses turn their focus away from recruiting.

Michigan recorded an unemployment rate of 9.3 percent in October, which was up from September’s rate of 8.7 percent and is the state’s highest monthly rate since July 1992.

In the past year, Michigan’s unemployment rate has swelled nearly 2 percent, and corresponds to a drop in the manufacturing and auto industries.

“Michigan’s economy relies more heavily than most states on the manufacturing sector, and that would tend to dampen our economy if other states are down and people can’t buy as much,” said Bruce Weaver, an economic analyst for the Michigan Department of Labor & Economic Growth.

The national unemployment rate soared to a 14-year high in October, reaching 6.5 percent and adding pressure to Michigan’s bruised economy.

“One of the main things is the auto industry, and the declines in employment that we’ve seen in particular states are playing a part in the national unemployment rate,” said Paul LaPorte, economist for the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Uncertainty in Michigan’s economic future is causing business recruiters to be more passive in their job-seeker searches, Gardner said.

“Students have to be much more active because the availability of jobs in the spring is much tougher,” Gardner said. “A lot of recruiters want to sit out and wait for the economy to get better in the spring.”

Retail positions, which usually provide opportunities to a wide range of students, will have a much narrower focus in the coming years because of struggles in the industry, Gardner said.

“Retail is down significantly, finance is off because of banking, manufacturing is still down, and the only bright spots are utilities and oil and gas,” he said.

Local fallout

Despite grim forecasts, local business turnout for MSU career events is still very strong among both small and large companies, and internship opportunities have never been more plentiful, said Paul Jaques, MSU’s internship developer.

“There are so many internships out there to be filled, and those might not necessarily lead to a job, but in many cases they do,” Jaques said.

Kate Tykocki, chief communications officer for Capital Area Michigan Works!, said the tough economy might not translate into fewer positions, but will at least make companies think twice before hiring more employees.

“It has affected businesses in that they’re being more tentative and not hiring as quickly,” Tykocki said. “It’s not that they have less work to do, they just have less capital available.”

At Melting Moments, 313 E. Grand River Ave., owners don’t put out applications anymore; they watch costs to keep up with the falling economy.

“What we do to compensate is we change our hours and prices accordingly,” employee Ian Sorenson-Abbott said.

Harsh economic conditions have forced California Juice Company, 549 E. Grand River Ave., to watch its spending and slow hiring.

“Basically we’re down to the owners working most of the time,” co-owner Erin Horton said. “It’s really slowed down in here.”