Mass immigration of Irish graduates to the US

Ireland, 21st August: It is being reported by the USI(Union of Students in Ireland) that a mass immigration of graduates from Ireland to overseas is taking place due to lack of opportunities of jobs in Ireland.

Rate of joblessness among graduates in Ireland has increased three times in the last two years forcing more and more graduates to move out of Ireland and seek immigration to nations including the US, Canada etc.

The UCD (University College Dublin) Students Union has lashed out against the inability of the Ireland government to control growing joblessness among youth in the country.

Jobless figures of young graduates in Ireland touched an all new high of 68,600 in March 2009 as compared to 25,400 in March 2008, the official data by CSO (Central Statistics Office) reveals.

The CSO figures for June 2010 reveal that the number of people below 25 years and without any jobs in Ireland was 91,646, President of USI, Gary Redmond stated. He said that it was astonishing that such an important issue was not getting attention of the government.

The Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Innovation, Batt O’Keeffe, is being blamed for the entire situation of unemployment in Ireland.

The USI is seeking to demonstrate against such attitude outside the offices of the minister and to bring the growing unemployment rate in Ireland under control.

It may be noted that due to poor opportunities of jobs in Ireland for young graduates, many Irish are seeking immigration to Australia and the US by applying for US work visas or Australian work visas. That is not all. Seeing the poor scenario in Ireland, many are likely to stay in the US or Australia on a permanent basis thus resulting in brain drain and contributions to the economy from Ireland to overseas nations.

With fewer options available in Ireland, a large number of Irish graduates are quitting colleges, warned Paul Lynam, Students Union President of UCD warned.

The last six years have witnessed an increase of unemployment in Ireland by 22 times faster than the Eurozone average.

And if strong measures are not taken by the government of Ireland, a big percentage of the total 150,000 graduates produced by Ireland in the coming five years will immigrate to other nations in search of jobs, stated, the USI.

Meanwhile, an official spokesman for the minister said that the government of Ireland is investing nearly €1.2bn for creation of 270,000 jobs by the year 2016.