Male graduates more likely to be unemployed six months after leaving university than women

Male graduates are more likely to be unemployed six months after leaving university than women (Getty Images)

Male graduates are more likely to be unemployed six months after leaving university than women, according to official statistics.

A study of more than 400,000 graduates who left university last summer showed that nine per cent of males were unemployed six months after quitting compared with just six per cent of women.

However, when it came to salaries, those men who had found their way into work were earning higher salaries than women with 32 per cent earning more than £25,000 a year - compared with just 18 per cent of women.

A breakdown of the figures, released by the Higher Education Statistics Agency, showed those who had studied dentistry or medicine had all found jobs - while, of those who had studied the creative arts, 11 per cent were on the dole. The highest unemployment figures were amongst those who had studied computer science - 14 per cent.

Overall, they showed that 67 per cent of UK and EU graduates had found full-time employment, seven per cent were mixing work with further study, 14 per cent had gone on to further study - i.e post graduate courses, seven per cent were unemployed and the remaining five per cent were unaccounted for.