Resentment is building as more workers feel stuck
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Illustration: Lindsey Bailey/Axios
Workers in the U.S. are running in place — feeling stuck in jobs with dimmed prospects of advancement and seeing fewer opportunities to jump ship for something better.
Why it matters: It's a sharp contrast to the heady days of 2022 — when employees were quitting their jobs at record high rates, open roles proliferated and the possibility of a higher paycheck always seemed just around the corner.
The big picture: Employers are sitting tight, says Daniel Zhao, lead economist at job site Glassdoor. Companies aren't making big changes to hiring strategy. That means "fewer opportunities for workers to climb the career ladder," he says.
- They're still plugging away at the same role they've had for years without the opportunity to move up internally or at a new company.
- 65% of the 3,400 professionals surveyed by Glassdoor last month said they feel stuck in their current role.
- "As workers feel stuck, pent-up resentment boils under the surface," Zhao writes in a report out yesterday.
State of play: By one broad measure — a relatively low unemployment rate of 4.1% — the job market looks good. Under the hood, though, things are stagnating.
- The rate at which workers quit their jobs in September was 1.9% — the lowest since June 2020 and, outside of Covid, a level last seen in 2015.
- It's well off the highs of the Great Resignation a few years ago.
By the numbers: The number of job openings in September was 7.4 million — a decline of 1.9 million from the previous year, though still higher than in 2019.
- And while layoffs are still low — below pre-pandemic levels — that's cold comfort if you want a new job or you're just starting out in the working world.
- An increasing share of those who do job hop are settling for lower paychecks. Some 17% of job switchers this year took a pay cut, compared to 14% in 2019, according to data from jobs site Glassdoor.
Zoom out: That the labor market just a few years ago was so exceptional — and worker leverage so high — makes today's stagnating job market even more of a bitter pill.
Zoom in: Workers in the tech industry likely feel this more than most — throughout the 2010s there was a war for talent in tech and in the post-pandemic period hiring boomed even more, making wages soar.
- Employers were even hoarding workers at one point.
- Those days are long gone. Employee satisfaction with career opportunities in information technology has declined by 7.5% this year from 2022, according to an analysis of Glassdoor reviews.
- "Tech is the poster child of the problems we're seeing right now in the job market," Zhao says. "There are a lot of people who feel like that promise once offered to them no longer applies."
