Man it’s so hard to get work here though. Even though I have a degree in IT it took me eight months to find even casual employment.

I’m fortunate, as a chef, my skills are always in demand, but I hear you on struggles for IT trained people.
Many of my closest friend are in various fields of IT (from support all the way through to programming and so on) and they’re either fighting for their jobs regularly, or struggling to find work. It’s the unfortunate side effect of many businesses seeking to cut IT costs and simply outsourcing whatever they can.