Employers have all the power again

These days, it’s an employers’ world, and workers are just living in it.

The Big Picture: During the post-pandemic “Great Resignation” from 2021 to 2023, employees had the upper hand and used it to negotiate for pay raises, benefits, and remote-work options. That era is over — and employers are gaining back all the ground they lost.

Between the Lines: Jobs are scarcer, lower-paying, more stagnant, and less flexible than they were just years ago.

• According to Gusto, 14.5% of employees were earning promotions in 2022 but now only 10% are — and it’s taking workers longer to earn them.
• Wage growth has slowed sharply from 9.5% in 2021 to 3% this past May. The average lowest wage people said they’d accept dropped from $84,000 last November to $74,000 in March.
• The portion of jobs that were hybrid or remote shrunk from 10% in 2022 to 7.5% this year.

Conclusion: Economic uncertainty has shaken the entire job market, but workers aren’t losing ground equally across all sectors. White-collar and tech jobs have been hit especially hard, while healthcare employees have fared better than most due to the high demand for their labor.

Prediction: Like much of the economy, this power dynamic is cyclical and will eventually tilt back to employees. But before that happens, expect unemployment to rise — and not for the upper class.