Coming to Terms with the Greek Crisis: Highly Educated Young Women’s Employment Struggles in Conditions of Economic Austerity

The global financial recession which began in 2008 has led to significant economic and social consequences for youth, with the case of Greece being a notable one in terms of severity. Repeated political-economic ‘shocks’ to the structure of Greek society have manifest in common situations of unemployment and underemployment. Although impacting heavily on the working classes, severe curtailments in medium-high-skilled labour have also been observed among the middle classes as well. Following these contexts, the article examines the experiences of highly educated young women in Greece (n = 36) as they navigate precarious employment within the midst of the Greek economic crisis. It is argued that rather than their educated status offering opportunities to deploy resources to help withstand the crisis, their high education levels create frustrations and barriers towards achieving suitable employment. These perceived mismatches between high education and low status and/or poor-quality work conditions are assessed in the context of research on emerging adulthood.