Changing jobs is typically the shortest path to a higher salary, but for the first time in almost 15 years staying put is paying better than moving on.
According to the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta’s Wage Growth Tracker “job stayers” are enjoying greater salary growth than “job switchers” for the first time since 2010—during the aftermath of the global financial crisis—and only the third time since the data set began in 1998.
In fact, just two years ago, at the height of the Great Resignation, workers were enjoying the highest premium for changing jobs in at least a generation.
“The returns on job switching have gone down, and I don’t know whether that’s driven by employees or employers,” says Melinda Pitts, research director of the Atlanta Fed’s Center for Human Capital Studies.
The last time job stayers outearned job seekers the causes were straightforward, but Pitts says this time around things aren’t as clear. “The unemployment rate is still really low. It’s still a pretty tight labor market, and that was not the case coming out of the Great Recession,” she says. “It appears that there’s something different this time, but I do not know for certain [what].”
Pitts explains that in the aftermath of the Great Resignation, a historically tight talent market inspired employers to offer more generous salaries to new hires, but as those costs ballooned, many invested more in retaining their existing workforce.
At the same time, those historically high wage premiums for job switchers in 2022 were in part driven by a broader workforce transition, wherein low-wage workers left hard-hit sectors like hospitality during the pandemic and reentered the workforce in higher-paying roles.
“There’s a possibility that the people who are switching [now] are different, or it could be that employers, even though the unemployment rate is still relatively low, their demand for workers is not as such that they need to offer higher wages,” she says. “We don’t know if it’s because the composition of workers who switch jobs has changed, or that employers are offering wages [to new hires] similar to their retention wages.”
Workers Feel Stuck—For Good Reason
Regardless of the cause, the reversal of that wage growth trend has many Americans feeling stuck in their current roles, and rightfully so.
According to a recent survey conducted by Resume Now, two-thirds believe they would be happier in a different job, and 60% have remained in their role longer than they wanted.
“There are quite a few different barriers to career changing, and some of them might just be imagined, but perception is reality,” says Resume Now career expert Keith Spencer. “People are worried about the potential for financial instability, particularly right now, so if I were thinking about switching jobs, but I was in a secure job, I might think it’s not a good time to leave.”
According to the survey, 35% of respondents fear changing jobs would result in a pay cut, and 34% worry about broader financial instability.
In fact, as 2024 came to a close, nearly two-thirds of professionals were concerned about career stagnation, including 73% of tech workers, and many said they intended to change jobs in the new year.
“We saw a lot of layoffs making big headlines throughout 2024, and that was starting to slow down as the year ended. Interest rates were starting to come down and inflation was starting to ease,” Spencer says, adding that the economy hasn’t played out the way many had hoped so far in 2025.
“Layoffs have far outpaced projections in the beginning of this year. So we saw those concerning trends starting to slow down, and then all of a sudden they picked back up,” he says. With the current market instability driven by President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs against global trade partners, Spencer fears more workers are going to feel stuck in “economic limbo” for longer.
Why things will likely get worse before they get better
Those new economic challenges cannot be understated and could soon lead to even fewer options for workers in the job market, says Solange Charas, a Columbia University professor and the founder-CEO of HR consulting firm HCMoneyball. “I don’t think people appreciate how impactful these tariffs are going to be—for the whole economy, obviously—but for individuals themselves, specifically,” she says.
Charas explains that the stock market’s reaction to Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff announcement last week is eating away at retirement savings. That could force boomers to remain in the workforce longer, increasing labor supply. At the same time, companies are likely to reevaluate their budgets for this year and make significant cuts, which will likely eat away at demand.
“The new tariffs are going to reshape the workforce strategy because they create a higher level of expense, and what’s the easiest thing to cut from your P and L? People,” she says. “People are not going to change jobs voluntarily, because of this tariff situation, and the stock market is reflecting that.”
While workers typically see wage growth for changing jobs, and job stayers were more recently enjoying a premium from retention-conscious employers, Charas fears neither is likely to see wage growth of any kind in the coming months.
“People are thinking about staying put, even if they feel like they’re stuck, because being able to put food on the table is going to take a higher priority than self-actualization,” she says. “People are not going to be job seekers right now, and I don’t know if that’s going to be for the next month, or the next four months, the next six months, or the next year. That is going to depend on how the economy reacts to these tariffs.”
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