Adapting to Change – Understanding Today’s Job Seekers

Labor market conditions have shifted meaningfully since the pandemic years, and a mix of fresh economic data and an annual job seeker survey shows where things stand now for recruiters and hiring teams.

On the economic side, hiring has decelerated then stabilized, unemployment has ticked up to levels not seen in years, and open jobs have dropped substantially from their post-pandemic peak. Wage growth has settled into a steadier annualized pace after the volatility of the last few years, and voluntary turnover, while still slightly elevated compared with pre-pandemic norms, has cooled well off the highs of the so-called great resignation. Demographic shifts are also reshaping the workforce, including a fast-growing population of workers over 65 and a labor force participation rate among prime-age workers at its highest point in over two decades.

An annual survey of job seekers, drawn from a large and demographically balanced sample across industries, adds detail to these trends:

• Respondents split fairly evenly between those actively searching for work and passive candidates not currently looking, with tenure in current roles distributed across experience levels.
• Side gig participation held steady year over year, with no meaningful change in the share of workers holding a second source of income.
• Among those with side gigs, the number of hours worked shifted slightly upward, with more people moving into higher weekly hour brackets rather than staying in the lowest tier.
• Candidate sentiment toward employers has grown more negative in a tighter labor market, with measured resentment toward past hiring experiences reaching levels not seen before in over a decade of tracking.

Together, the economic indicators and survey results point to a labor market settling into a new normal rather than snapping back to pre-pandemic patterns. That has direct implications for how organizations think about candidate pools, competition for talent, and the experience candidates carry with them into future job searches, particularly as resentment toward poor hiring experiences climbs and fewer open roles mean more scrutiny of every employer interaction.