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It's going to be hard for 2020 college grads to find a job in this market

Instead of popping bottles and celebrating a huge life accomplishment, graduates are facing a bad economy that could crush their career plans.

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — For those graduating in 2020: the struggle is real. 

Not only are college seniors having to put their graduation ceremonies on hold or having to cancel them altogether, their hopes for the future might also have to take a back seat.

A bad economy could crush their career plans.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the Great Recession in the last decade shrank the American workforce by 8.8 million jobs. When that recession ended in 2009, college graduates faced an unemployment rate of 10.9 percent, according to research from Federal Reserve Economic Data.

That number was even higher than the 9.5 percent the nation was seeing at the same time.

For April of this year, Federal Research Economic Data is reporting graduates between the ages of 20 and 24 who earned a bachelor's degree saw a much higher unemployment rate: 17.2 percent.

That's higher than any number the U.S. has ever seen.

There isn't too much good news for those lucky graduates who do score a job right now, either. 

A study done by an economics professor at the University of Rochester, Lisa B. Kahn, showed that white men who graduated during the 1980 recession had lower wages than their counterparts who started their careers when the economy was good. 

Another study done by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York had similar findings for the Great Recession from 2007-2009. The research said almost half of the college graduates who were working at the time and were in the early stages of their careers were underemployed. 

Credit: US Bureau of Labor Statistics

The U.S. unemployment rate hit 14.7 percent in April, the highest rate since the Great Depression of the 1930s, as 20.5 million jobs vanished in the worst monthly loss on record.  

In Florida, the unemployment rate for March spiked to 4.3 percent from 2.8 percent the month before. 

RELATED: Jobless rate spikes to 14.7%, highest since the Great Depression

RELATED: Jobless claims in Florida dropped more than half last week

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