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- 57% of U.S. workers plan to stay in their current role this year — a near-complete reversal from 2025, when 93% planned to test the market
- 80% expect job market conditions to stagnate or deteriorate, while 52% anticipate a nationwide rise in layoffs
- Only 22% of workers globally are confident their position is safe from elimination — and confidence falls sharply at lower seniority levels
- Workers who feel their employer is investing in their skills are 5.3 times more likely to feel job-secure, making upskilling requests a concrete negotiating lever
The Evidence
Eighty percent. That is the share of U.S. workers heading into this year who expect the job market to either deteriorate or hold flat — a number drawn from the Monster WorkWatch 2026 Report surveying 1,504 U.S. workers, corroborated independently by an ADP Research global survey of 39,000 workers across 36 markets published March 25, 2026.
According to Google News, citing Money Talks News, the 2026 data documents one of the sharpest reversals in job-search psychology on record. In 2025, fully 93% of workers planned to look for new opportunities. This year, 57% say they have no intention of leaving — a swing of nearly forty percentage points in a single year. Monster career expert Vicki Salemi framed the contrast directly: "Last year, workers believed movement was the answer. In 2025, people were willing to test the market, walk away from bad experiences, and bet on change."
The Bureau of Labor Statistics JOLTS report for March 2026 gives the trend a hard number: the voluntary quit rate held at 2.0%, representing 3.2 million total quits — down 285,000 from the same period a year earlier. Labor economists now call this period the "Great Stay" — the structural reversal of the 2021–2022 "Great Resignation," when voluntary separations hit generational highs. Since that peak, quit rates have contracted by nearly one-third, and total job openings have nearly halved.
The anxiety runs deeper than quitting patterns. Monster's report found that 52% of workers expect nationwide layoffs to increase this year. At the company level, 13% say layoffs at their own employer are "extremely likely," with another 34% calling them "somewhat likely" — meaning nearly half of the U.S. workforce views their current employer as a layoff risk. A November 2025 Resume.org survey of 1,200 full-time workers adds generational texture: 57% of Gen Z and 45% of Millennials say they are likely to job hunt in 2026, compared with only 29% of Gen X and 20% of Boomers. Younger workers remain more mobile, but even their intent numbers trail 2025 significantly.
What It Means for Your Wages, Savings, and Investment Portfolio
The Great Stay is not merely a career narrative — it carries direct implications for household finances and for the stock market today in ways that are easy to underestimate.
When workers stop voluntarily leaving, employers face far less competitive pressure to raise compensation. Monster's WorkWatch report found that 58% of workers name salary failing to keep pace with inflation as their single biggest financial concern for the year. That fear is grounded in arithmetic. A worker earning $75,000 with 2% annual raises in a 3.5% inflation environment loses roughly $1,125 in real purchasing power per year — a gap that compounds quietly over time and chips away at any investment portfolio or financial planning target a household has set.
ADP Research's March 2026 global survey found that job security confidence varies dramatically by organizational rank:
Chart: Percentage of workers who strongly agree their job is safe from elimination, by seniority level. ADP Research Global Workforce Survey, March 2026, n=39,000 across 36 markets.
Put plainly: if you are an individual contributor, fewer than one in five of your peers globally feel their role is genuinely secure. That single data point should inform both your financial planning approach and how conservatively you structure your investment portfolio relative to your income stability. ADP Research's own finding reinforces why this matters beyond psychology — workers who feel their employer is investing in their skills are 5.3 times more likely to report feeling secure, and secure workers are six times more likely to be fully engaged, 6.3 times more likely to describe themselves as highly motivated, and 3.3 times more likely to call themselves productive. Insecurity is not just a personal finance problem; it is an organizational performance problem hiding in plain sight.
ADP's engagement data compounds the concern: only 19% of workers globally were fully engaged in 2025, a figure that held flat year-over-year despite widespread employer attention to culture and retention. As Smart Wealth AI recently examined in its look at the personal finance anxiety gap closing in on younger Americans, financial stress and low workplace engagement typically reinforce each other — making it harder to save, invest, or build any meaningful buffer.
For anyone watching the stock market today for macro signals: consumer spending drives roughly 70% of U.S. GDP. A workforce that is anxious, disengaged, and falling behind on real wages tends to pull back on discretionary purchases first — which ripples into retail earnings, then housing demand, then broader consumer confidence. Workforce sentiment surveys like these are more useful as forward-looking indicators than most of the technical signals retail investors typically follow.
One genuine counterweight: the side hustle surge. Monster's survey found that 32% of workers already maintain a secondary income stream, and another 30% plan to launch one this year — putting roughly 62% of the workforce treating gig income as either a current hedge or an imminent one. From a personal finance resilience standpoint, that is a structural shift in how households are managing income risk, and it deserves to be treated as a genuine financial planning variable rather than a hobby.
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The AI Angle
Artificial intelligence sits at the center of this uncertainty from two directions simultaneously. On one side, automation pressure is a frequently cited driver behind the layoff expectations that 52% of workers hold entering this year. On the other, AI tools are actively helping workers shore up their financial positions in response to exactly that pressure.
AI investing tools like Betterment, Wealthfront, and Empower (formerly Personal Capital) make it easier to keep investment portfolio contributions consistent even during turbulent employment stretches — setting automated rules so saving continues even when anxiety tempts workers to pause contributions. For personal finance visibility across multiple income streams, platforms like Monarch Money use machine learning to track side hustle revenue alongside primary salary in one unified view — increasingly relevant as the 62% gig-income figure grows.
For workers navigating the salary-inflation squeeze, AI-powered compensation benchmarking tools — Levels.fyi, Payscale, or LinkedIn Salary Insights — can surface market-rate data for specific roles and geographies in minutes. Entering a raise conversation armed with that data is a fundamentally different financial planning posture than guessing. That intelligence layer is one of the few concrete advantages this economic environment offers to workers who choose to use it.
How to Act on This — 3 Moves Worth Making Now
ADP Research's data creates a specific negotiating case: workers who feel their employer is actively investing in their development are 5.3 times more likely to feel job-secure, and secure workers are six times more likely to be fully engaged and 3.3 times more likely to describe themselves as productive. That is a business case, not a personal plea. Here is a script worth sending: "Hi [Manager], I have been thinking about how I can grow in ways that directly benefit the team this year. Could we find 30 minutes to discuss what skill development looks like for my role? I am curious which certifications or training would be most valuable from the company's perspective." This is not a raise conversation — it is a job-security play framed as a development request. If they engage meaningfully, your statistical odds of feeling indispensable improve significantly. If they have no real answer, you have learned something important about your BATNA (best alternative to a negotiated agreement — meaning your fallback position if your employment situation changes). Either outcome is useful information.
With 62% of the workforce either running or planning a side hustle, secondary income has transitioned from a backup plan to a mainstream financial planning variable. If you are among the 30% planning to launch something this year, do not wait until the pressure is acute. Use a weekly planner to carve out consistent time for the project, track income and expenses separately from your primary salary from day one, and set a monthly review cadence. Even a few hundred dollars per month in secondary income shifts your negotiating position with any employer — because your livelihood no longer depends entirely on a single source. That is leverage that requires no counter-offer conversation and no permission from your manager.
Before assuming your compensation is holding pace with market reality, verify it. The BLS CPI calculator (available free at bls.gov) lets you convert your salary history into today's purchasing power equivalents. Pair that with a benchmarking tool like Payscale or Glassdoor to see what your role commands in your specific market right now. If you are behind on both counts — and 58% of workers suspect they are — that gap belongs in your personal finance math and your investment portfolio projections, not just in a private grievance. Presenting real compensation data in a review conversation is not complaining; it is framing a business discussion around market facts. Use AI investing tools and salary benchmarking to arm yourself with numbers before you sit down.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is the U.S. job market actually getting worse in 2026 or does it just feel that way?
Multiple independent data sources point to genuine structural cooling rather than pure perception. The BLS JOLTS report for March 2026 shows the voluntary quit rate at 2.0% — 3.2 million quits, down 285,000 year-over-year — a multi-year low consistent with workers choosing to stay rather than risk a move. Monster's WorkWatch survey of 1,504 workers found 80% expect conditions to stagnate or decline. ADP Research, drawing on 39,000 workers across 36 markets, found only 22% feel their position is safe from elimination. These are three separate data collections pointing in the same direction, which is more meaningful than any single survey result.
How should I adjust my investment portfolio if layoffs seem likely at my company this year?
Start by confirming your emergency fund covers at least three to six months of essential expenses before you optimize for investment returns. A well-funded cash cushion means you are not forced to sell investment holdings at an inconvenient time if your income is disrupted. For the investment portfolio itself, consider whether your current asset allocation — the mix of stocks, bonds, and other assets — reflects your actual risk tolerance given your job security profile. If you fall into the individual contributor tier, where only 18% of workers globally report feeling secure, a somewhat more conservative allocation may be worth discussing with a fee-only financial planner.
What are the best AI investing tools to use when my income feels unstable?
For automated investment portfolio management, Betterment and Wealthfront offer rules-based contribution schedules that continue even when you are not actively monitoring markets. Empower (formerly Personal Capital) provides a free net worth dashboard connecting salary, savings, and investments in one view — useful for seeing the complete financial picture during uncertain periods. For salary benchmarking before a raise conversation, Levels.fyi and Payscale offer role-specific, geography-adjusted market data. None of these tools replace personalized financial planning from a licensed professional, but they provide a solid foundation for self-directed research and preparation.
Why are younger workers more likely to job hunt in 2026 than older generations even in a down market?
A Resume.org survey of 1,200 full-time U.S. workers published in November 2025 found that 57% of Gen Z workers and 45% of Millennials planned to job hunt this year, compared with 29% of Gen X and 20% of Boomers. The disparity reflects career stage more than attitude: younger workers have more to gain from a lateral move that improves compensation trajectory, while older workers with longer tenure, accrued benefits, and higher seniority have more to lose by starting over with a new employer. The Great Stay affects all generations — its grip simply tightens with career length.
How does widespread worker disengagement affect the stock market today and corporate earnings outlooks?
ADP Research found that only 19% of workers globally were fully engaged in 2025, unchanged from the prior year. Sustained disengagement at that scale has macroeconomic consequences — lower productivity growth, subdued organic wage pressure, and cautious consumer spending — all of which eventually surface in earnings estimates and equity valuations. For anyone tracking the stock market today, sectors with high labor intensity such as retail, logistics, and hospitality may face more earnings headwinds from the engagement deficit than forward guidance currently reflects. Workforce sentiment data like this is rarely part of the average retail investor's research process, but the connection to fundamentals is direct and documented.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational and educational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, or career advice. All data cited reflects publicly available survey and government sources as of May 2026. Always consult a qualified financial professional before making investment or employment decisions.