These are the top workplace fears for U.S. employees right now
At the start of the year, a survey from workplace platform Modern Health identified that a huge 75 percent of the American workforce said they were experiencing some form of low mood.
Unsurprisingly, politics and current events are the key drivers of U.S. workers' worries.
Workers' mental health is taking a beating as a result, with 74 percent saying they want mental-health resources specifically addressing global political turmoil.
For many employees, things are as bad as they've ever been. Almost half of the survey respondents said life was easier during the COVID-19 pandemic than it is now.
4 jobs hiring across the east coast
Executive Director, ROA, Washington D.C.
Director of Policy – North America, Ellen MacArthur Foundation, Washington D.C. or New York City
Senior Campaigner (17-Month Fixed Term), Amnesty International USA, New York City / Washington D.C.
Director of Government Affairs, Blueprint Biosecurity, Washington D.C.
'American employees are struggling with their mental health, with global political turmoil and current events taking a particularly dire toll, and it's detrimental to how employees are showing up in the workplace,' says Alyson Watson, founder, and CEO of Modern Health.
Those factors are bad enough, but another piece of research identifies that a majority of Americans are also concerned about the prospect of losing their job this year.
Job losses loom
Another study, conducted by My Perfect Resume, outlines growing fears among workers.
Eighty-one percent are afraid they'll lose their job in 2025, and 20 percent of those are 'much more worried' about finding themselves unemployed in 2025 than they were a year ago.
Adding to that are fears that finding a new job won't be easy, with 57 percent expecting that finding a new position will be as difficult or harder than it was in 2024.
Even more worries are weighing hard on workers' minds. Ninety-two percent are concerned about a recession this year, and 33 percent believe the overall labor market will worsen.
Burnout is on the rise with workers' saying that increased workloads (29 percent), and lack of work-life balance (23 percent), are the significant contributing factors.
For those who have already been hit by job cuts this year, former president Joe Biden's recent comments at the national conference of Advocates, Counselors and Representatives for the Disabled (ACRD) in Chicago, may have hit home.
Biden hit out at cuts at the Social Security Administration and said a 'hatchet' had been taken to the organization.
'Already we can see the effects, for example, thousands of people who use the Social Security website every single day to check on their benefits and submit their claims,' he said.
'But now, the technology division of the Social Security administration has been cut in half. And so the website's crashing. People can't sign onto their accounts. What do you think it does?'
Remote work disappearing
American workers are also concerned about the erosion of remote and hybrid working.
Eighty-eight percent of respondents to My Perfect Resume's study said they predict more companies will require employees to return to the office this year.
While the most recent report from WFH Research, which monitors working from home before and since the start of the pandemic, found that these days, working from home is most common in the finance, tech, and professional and business services sectors.
It also identified that 13 percent of full-time employees are now fully remote, 61 percent are full-time on site, and 26 percent are working in a hybrid manner.
It is clear that as a result of waves of return to office mandates, fewer workers than before are able to enjoy a completely remote setup.
However, some light has emerged at the end of the tunnel for workers at the Food and Drug Administration, for example.
Just weeks after workers there were ordered back into the office, and were met with a range of issues like limited parking and makeshift office spaces, the agency has had a change of heart. It will now allow certain staff to work remotely, such as its review staff and supervisors.
In general however, jobs are trending away from offering remote working. LinkedIn statistics show that just 8 percent of jobs were remote as of December 2024. That's down from 18 percent in early 2022.
One outlier has emerged here, however: high paying, in-demand positions are still more likely to be offered for remote working.
Career site Ladders found that 10.4 percent of roles that pay $250,000 or more were advertised as remote in the third quarter of 2024.
The takeaway is that if you've got skills that are in demand in the labor market, you've still got negotiating power to work the way that suits you.
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