Graduating college seniors will face the nation's toughest job market in at least 20 years, according to a recent study conducted by researchers at Michigan State University.

The report, based on a survey of 549 U.S. employers, projects that recession and the possibility of war in the Middle East will lead to a 10 percent drop in the hirings of this spring's graduates.

Taken with 1990's 13 percent drop from the year before, such a fall-off would represent the most significant decrease in hiring since 1970, when Michigan State first surveyed employers, said L. Patrick Scheetz, assistant director of the univeristy's collegiate Employment Research Institute.

"The budget deficit, the potential of armed conflict in the Middle East and the general economic recession have caused an uncertainty that has permeated the market," Scheetz said. "Employers must play it safe now to make profits, hiring few college graduates until the economy is back on a steady upward trend."

While the national scene does not favor college graduates looking-for employment, prospects should be a little brighter for the upcoming Harvard graduates, said Judy Murray, coordinator of recruiting for Harvard's Office of Career Services (OCS).

"In what seems to be a gloom and doom year for recruiting, the Harvard students definitely seem to have an advantage," Murray said. "Most all of the firms who interviewed here last year are coming back--and some new firms, such as CNN, will be here as well. The students here should realize that they are quite fortunate."

Murray cautioned, however, that "whether or not they will be hiring at similar levels remains to be seen. Corporations might still cut down from 30 to 20 new employees, and spend moretime searching for the 20 people who best fittheir needs."

To counteract that possibility, an increasednumber of seniors are applying to graduate school,said Marc Cosentino, the business counselor atOCS. "By continuing their education, students arefinding a safe harbor in this recession,"Cosentino said. "They are also protectingthemselves from the reinstatement of the draft."

Cosentino added that many upcoming graduatesare "blanketing the market" by searching for jobson their own instead of relying on the passiverecruiting process.

One such senior, Eunice S. Wang `91, said sheplans to leave the troubled northeast for morepromising opportunities elsewhere, even if thatsearch takes her overseas.

"The unemployment level here is so high, andthe economy, epecially in Massachusetts, isawful," said Wang, a biology concentrator wholives in Dunster House. "If I can't find a goodjob with a biotechnology firm in the U.S., I mightgo to Asia to do the same thing or to teachEnglish, because there are more jobs there, and itis easier to make money."

Not everyone, however, has such a bleakprognosis for this year's job market. VictorLindquist, director of placement at NorthwesternUniversity who conducted a study whose findingsmirrored those of the Michigan State survey, saidthat the media has blown out of proportion theseverity of the job shortage.

"While the situation is definitely worse thanit was a few years ago, it's not as bad as thepopular press is having us believe--the jobs areout there," Linquist said. "The best thing to sayto this year's graduates is to be ready for somerejection, but to work harder, longer, and withmore diligence."

Linquist said that with the crunch in hiring,"the biggest problem for this year's graduateslooking for jobs is that they will be battlingwith graduates of a few years ago who have a lotmore experience."

But, according to Cosentino, this lack ofexperience may work to the advantage of the newgraduates.

"People who have been out of college for threeor four years are in a tougher position,"Cosentino said. "They won't be willing to takelower-level, low-playing grunt work, but thosefresh out of college will be more apt to takethose positions."

Scheetz, who conducted the Michigan Statesurvey, said that new graduates must not take anyopportunities lightly, or they might very wellfind themselves without a job in June.

"The worst thing the graduates can do is to beoverconfident and hesitant to take a job beneaththeir capabilities," Scheetz said. "They shouldpursue every option, including family connections,and respond quickly to their offers, or they couldbe left on the outside looking in.