What are the likelihoods of getting a job in these areas (graphic design careers?)?

Speaking as a designer turned illustrator I would say these are highly competitive career choices. You have to be very thick skinned, focused and ambitious to get ahead but when you do the rewards are great. If you are talented and prepared to work very hard then you will do well in which ever career path you choose. Good luck.

I'm afraid to have to tell you this but all of these jobs are really difficult to get into, since the rise in people interested in all things computers and internet jobs such as web designers and graphics designers have been most people dreams, with few getting jobs after they had done there degrees etc. There ain't enough jobs available for a large percentage of the trained graphic designers out there, many having to retrain in something else to be able to find a job at all. A lot of graduates depend on companies offering them placements and jobs as soon as they leave uni, if you haven't been offered one the chances are you won't find one. The competition is of a very high standard, with top students missing out. If it's what you want to do by all means give it all you've got, whilst your studying try to make contacts with local businesses that provide these services or do business with people that do. The ones that succeed are the ones that have the contacts, if your dad knows a guy from accounting whose wife's sister is a graphic designer try and make contact with her. Show your interest and ask if she'd be willing to look over your portfolio, you make a contact and if she likes your work, she may just offer you a trainee position. The hardest part is getting that first step in, even if its voluntary work for a few weeks all the work experience you Can get will make you better then someone else.