The warning follows a survey of more than 300 workers, which included 100 people from three separate categories of production, sales and account management, plus a sample of 10 managing directors, which found that nearly a third of production workers were still out of work after six months of being unemployed.
This came despite an average of 80% from each sample being registered with more than four agencies.
While the majority (98%) of production staff had been placed within six months last year, 27% of job seekers were still out of work after six months in 2009.
Within this group, which encompassed operations director, production director and shift manager roles, 28% of candidates were found work in the first month. This was in comparison to 42% who found work within a month in 2008.
George Thompson, joint managing director of print recruitment business Harrison Scott, said it was "alarming" that such a high percentage of people were still out of employment.
He said: "An expression not normally associated with the print industry can now unfortunately be applied and that is ‘long-term unemployment'."
Thompson added that finding work for production staff is in stark contrast to the demand for sales staff where there is no change from the same period last year in which 85% found a new job within one month.
The agency's findings came as trade union Unite warned that UK unemployment could pass 3m before the end of the year is out.
Figures from the Office for National Statistics showed that the number of jobless in the UK has reached its highest level since 1995, with more than 2.4m out of work.
Unite assistant general secretary Tony Burke said: "I can see it happening - 5,000 [people] have lost jobs within print, paper and packaging since April this year... the level of unemployment can only go up ."
EMPLOYMENT FACTFILE
? Average of 80% from each sample registered with at least four agencies
? Nearly one-third of production staff still out of work after six months
? 85% of sales staff found work within one month
? 97% of workers found jobs within six months in 2008, compared to
80% in 2009
