A preliminary report by the education ministry shows that roughly 1 in 5 of the country's university graduates this spring were either jobless or without secure employment.
The 20.7 percent of graduates in the category represented a 2.2 percentage point decline from a year earlier.
Of the 558,853 graduates, 67.3 percent — 375,959 — took full-time positions of some kind or were self-employed, up 3.4 points, while 22,786 took jobs that were not secure.
Although job market conditions have been improving for graduates since the 2008 global financial crisis, the ministry said Wednesday that "the situation remains that some students enter the workforce in the way they don't really desire."
There were 16,850, or 3 percent, who took part-time positions. Those without jobs or who didn't pursue further studies numbered 75,928, or 13.6 percent, while 72,821, or 13 percent, advanced to graduate school.
Since the last school year, the ministry started counting those without "secure employment."
This category — 20.7 percent of the graduates in the latest preliminary survey — covers those without jobs or not in school, those with part-time jobs, as well as those with fixed-period employment of one year or longer, either full or part time.
The preliminary data also showed that 30,770, or 5.5 percent, were in the so-called NEET status, which denotes young people who were "not in education, employment, or training."