There were a number of stories that were reported over the past few days that illustrate the state – and state-of-mind – of the US workforce.
• Gallup is out with a study saying that “the personal and professional environment of U.S. workers was worse at the end of 2025 than at any point in the past three years across several important metrics. For the first time since Gallup began tracking the life evaluation of the U.S. workforce, more workers report struggling in their lives (49%) than thriving (46%): a stark reversal from 2022 and 2023 when more than half of employees were classified as thriving. This is coupled with U.S. worker engagement dropping to the lowest level on record in the past decade at 31% engaged employees.
“Similar trends cut across multiple dimensions of economic perceptions. Confidence in the job market has collapsed to a new low, with just 28% of workers saying now is a good time to find a quality job, down from 70% in mid-2022. More than half of workers are actively looking for a new job or at least watching for opportunities. And nearly half of those actively searching report it has been a negative experience, with many unable to land an interview.
“Some workers are feeling the strain more acutely than others. The life thriving rate of federal workers has decreased 12 percentage points on average since 2022. For the first time in the past three years, college-educated workers are the most pessimistic about the job market, and younger workers are more likely than older ones to say it is a bad time to find a good quality job.
“The data point to a workforce that is restless but largely stuck. Many workers who want to leave cite economic constraints — from pay and benefits to the difficulty of finding a comparable role — as the primary barriers to making a move. With life evaluation at a record low and job market confidence near historic lows, the conditions weighing on U.S. workers show few signs of easing.
“For the first time since Gallup began measuring the life evaluation of the American workforce, more U.S. workers are struggling in their lives (49%) than thriving (46%). This contrasts with 2022 and 2023, when the reverse was true, with the share of U.S. employees considered ‘thriving’ staying in the low-to-mid 50s — a mark of relative resilience after pandemic disruptions. After staying steady between 57% and 60% from 2009 to 2019, the thriving rate among workers fell to 55% in 2020 before rebounding in 2021 then steadily decreasing after that.”
• From the New York Times:
“This is the worst spring for young degree holders since the depths of the pandemic.
“The unemployment rate for college graduates ages 22 to 27 soared to 5.6 percent at the end of last year, according to an analysis from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, up sharply over the past three years and outstripping the overall rate of 4.2 percent at the time. For those who were employed, more than 40 percent held jobs that do not typically require college degrees, the highest level since 2020.”
The Times writes that “the diminished prospects for young graduates are colliding with questions over whether artificial intelligence is destroying the kinds of jobs they have long sought. Fueling those concerns have been dire warnings from A.I. leaders including Dario Amodei, chief executive of Anthropic, who predicted the technology could obliterate half of entry-level white-collar jobs within five years. A report in November from the Stanford Digital Economy Lab found ‘substantial declines in employment for early-career workers’ in fields that were most vulnerable to A.I., such as software development.
“Although A.I. may be replacing some entry-level jobs on the margins, there is little evidence it is the main culprit — at least not yet. Rather, many economists believe employment challenges for young people with college degrees stem more from the ‘low hire, low fire’ dynamics in the labor market.
“Job openings have been trending down and are below prepandemic levels even as layoffs have remained low. A result has been a broad hiring stasis among employers that has hurt all new entrants to the labor market, a group that includes young workers with college degrees — and those without them.”
And, the Times goes on:
“A possible contributing factor is that the labor market’s cool-down in the past few years has been concentrated in industries that generally attract young graduates, including technology, media, accounting and consulting. More people are also graduating with college degrees, heightening the competition for entry-level white-collar jobs.
“Some economists have hypothesized that the challenging labor market for young degree holders could be the outcrop of a longer-term demographic shift that is making it more difficult for them to procure white-collar jobs.”
• From Axios:
“The U.S. workforce has more women than men for only the third time ever.” However, “this isn’t quite a women’s empowerment story.
“Traditionally male-dominated occupations are shrinking, while female-led jobs are growing. (They still tend to be lower-paid, though.)
“Two dynamics are driving the shift: 1. Health care — a female-dominated field — is the job market’s fastest-growing sector. Job growth in the largely male construction and manufacturing fields has been flat or negative.
Fewer men are participating in the job market.
“Male employment fell by 142,000 jobs from February 2025 to February 2026. That’s partly because President Trump’s immigration crackdown has pushed a lot more men out of the workforce.
“It would seem like a no-brainer for more men to move into health care. But some are reluctant to take jobs that can be seen as ‘women’s work’.
“Economist Richard Reeves, founder of the advocacy group American Institute for Boys and Men, tells Axios: ‘Men are missing out in the labor market because there are too many ‘no-go’ zones for male workers’.”
• The Wall Street Journal reports that “AI’s workplace impact, including its potential to help careers, remains more the subject of economics papers than hard evidence. But young people, especially those just launching into long working lives ahead of them, are starting to navigate their future career choices with AI in mind.
“Some are pivoting to blue-collar work or starting their own businesses that may insulate them from the impacts of AI. Others are actively embracing it to try to take advantage of an AI boom and stay ahead of the curve.”
The Journal writes that “a recent Harvard survey of Americans between ages 18 and 29 showed that 59% said they saw AI as a threat to their job prospects, with college graduates in particular sharing such concerns. A further 41% said they thought that AI would make work less meaningful.
“Stanford University research, meanwhile, found that between late 2022 and September 2025, employment among workers ages 22 to 25 who are highly exposed to AI – such as software developers and customer service agents – declined 16% relative to less-exposed occupations.”
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