ECOFORUM [Volume 4, Special Issue 1, 2015] 247 Larisa-Loredana DRAGOLEA “1 Decembrie 1918” University of Alba Iulia, 5100099, Romania larisadragolea@yahoo.com Abstract In a period when the labour market in any field is more and more vulnerable, inconstant and permanently changing, the field of economics follows the same trend, with much turbulence and multiple changes of directions and tendencies, both as regards the labour demand and the supply.Graduates in the fields of economics are affected to a large extent by the lack of secure job offers, and many times they choose retraining or migration, thus becoming a workforce qualified in a country and carrying out its activity in a different country. This article presents the results of a research performed in 2015, among graduates with specialisations in economics at the `1 Decembrie 1918` University of Alba Iulia, which will illustrate their perception of employment oportunities in a field that is related to the one they have studied at the university. Key words: economic field, employability, graduates, labour market JEL Classification: A23, J40 I. INTRODUCTION Labor market is one of the main components of the market economy together with the goods and capital market. The labor market refers to the workforce. In everyday perception, workforce is concerned with the ability of a person to work. From an economic perspective, the labour market is one of the components of the production forces and workforce and it is based on the meeting and matching of supply and demand. The need for work is present in any society, where the employment of workers, the salary and the working conditions are negotiated. The labor market is the framework for the confrontation between workforce supply and demand within a certain period of time and in a particular place, which results in the sale and purchase of workforce in exchange for a price called salary, functioning in each country, in different groups of countries and at a global level. As a subsystem of the general system of national economy, labour market is the framework within which is exploited the most important factor of production - labour - by the use of workforce. In turn, „labor market is a system that is defined by all the economic relations related to the employment and use of workforce, as well as to ensuring protection and social security for workers“. (N.G. Niculescu) II. LITERATURE REVIEW In the opinion of G. Cretoiu, workforce market or labor market can be defined as „the economic space where the workforce demand (capital holders as buyers) and supply (workers) meet and confront, being subject to free negotiation.“ Labor market at the level of each country can refer to a town, a smaller or larger area more or to the entire economy and has different phases: in the case of workforce that is unqualified or of lower qualification, the area is smaller and the needs of workforce can be covered at the level of a town; as the level of qualification of the workforce increases, the workforce of higher qualification is more rare, thus appearing the necessity to extend the area of the labor market to wider zones or even to the entire territory of the country. Different approaches to economics such as neoclassical and institutional economics present other definitions of the market. Thus, the market is seen as „a process with a dynamic character, and it is related to the phenomenon of the division of labor and to the private property (Ludwig von Mises).“ Young persons who have already entered the workforce, have unrealistic expectations and projections, but graduates who do not have any experience on the labour market yet project their future workplace as being in line with their expectations. The needs of young people in relation to the labor market follow a general trend and they are related to the perception regarding the development of the economy, the training of young people, job offers and professional and personal development. CASE STUDY ON THE INTENTIONS AND THE POSSIBILITIES OF ACCESS ON THE LABOUR MARKET OF HIGHER EDUCATION GRADUATES IN THE FIELD OF ECONOMICS