Because of Puerto Rico's poor economy, which has endured a recession for almost eight years, and job market, many college grads are leaving the island in favor of the United States in hopes of employment.

According to the Puerto Rico Statistics Institute, about 75,000 people with an average age of 33 years old left the U.S. commonwealth and headed toward the U.S. mainland in 2012, EFE reports. Fifty-two percent of these young people had some sort of college education. Thirty-five percent of them were married.

In 2011, Pew Research reported that 4.9 million Puerto Ricans live in the U.S. mainland, versus just 3.7 million living in Puerto Rico. A reason for this is the archipelago's economy, which has been in recession since 2006 and has an unemployment rate of 15 percent, while that of the mainland is just 7.3 percent, CNN reports.

Pedro Eloy Guzman, a married 33-year-old engineer, understands the desire for relocation. He had experience working for Alternate Concepts, Boston Scientific, Doral Bank and Microsoft before finding himself unemployed in November 2013 and subsequently moving to the continental U.S.

"The [Puerto Rican] labor market is a relatively closed ecosystem," he said. "It makes an engineer look like just one of the many."

Eventually, Guzman got hired by Seattle-based Amazon. He has been there less than a month but already finds it "a pretty big change both professionally and personally."

"Corporate culture here is much freer than in Puerto Rico because the atmosphere is calmer, and it promotes the idea that any employee can make a difference to his company," he explained.

Another example of this movement is Jesus Manuel De Leon, a married 33-year-old with an MBA and graduate studies in electrical engineering. He had been an engineer for various telecom companies since 2006 but could not a get contract renewal recently. De Leon has lived in New York for the past few weeks.

"The field is completely saturated," he said "There's much more supply than demand. I was going to have a hard time finding work in Puerto Rico."

Meanwhile, Jaime Rodriguez, 27, recently relocated to St. Joseph, Missouri because he also feels the job market is saturated.

"There are so many students who finish university with perfect grades, pass their final exams and take their degrees, but they still don't find work ... and for many of those who do, it's not because of what they know but who they know," he said.
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