Job hopping was once all the rage, but the days of big salary increases from switching careers might be over

This month, the global organizational consultancy firm Korn Ferry declared that we’ve entered a nationwide era of “job hugging,” a term to describe the trend of workers increasingly holding onto their positions for dear life amid economic uncertainty, layoffs, and AI disruption.

Now, a new report from the Bank of America Institute is shedding fresh light on the trend, showing that workers may be choosing to cling onto their current jobs because “job hopping” is no longer profitable. 

A few years ago, job hopping—or moving from company to company in search of better opportunities—was seen as a popular way to achieve a salary and résumé boost.

In 2023, a Resume Builder survey of 1,000 Gen Zers and millennials found that 62% percent of respondents had left their jobs because they wanted a higher salary, and 80% of people who left said they got a salary increase. Of the self-proclaimed job hoppers, about a fifth received a boost of $50,000 or more.

Today, those tales of ultra-successful transitions between companies feel like a thing of the past.

A July report from Arlington, Virginia-based Eagle Hill Consulting showed that the majority of employees plan to stay in their current position for at least the next six months, with the Gen Z employees who once led the job-hopping charge reporting the highest intent to remain where they are.

According to the BoA Institute’s new report, there are several good reasons for the cooldown.

Pessimism is worse than during the pandemic

Job seekers are currently feel pretty pessimistic about the labor market, and for good reason: A recent report from global outplacement and coaching firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas found that through the end of July, U.S.-based employers had announced more than 800,000 job eliminations in 2025, while, per a report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the U.S. economy created just 73,000 new jobs in July.

Further, based on the University of Michigan’s consumer sentiment survey released August 15, the percentage of respondents expecting unemployment to rise in the next year has hit a 10-year high, surpassing even the early pandemic era.

Payoffs for switching jobs have declined

Amid this climate, the data from the BoA Institute indicates that job hopping is largely on pause. Although job hopping has increased slightly since the start of 2025, the estimated rate has trended continuously downward since its peak of 26% in 2022. 

The report adds that those who do hop jobs are no longer getting a big bump in pay, “with job-to-job pay raises having moderated to around 7% in July—more than 3 percentage points below the 2019 average level.”

As the current economic uncertainty continues, it appears that job hopping is no longer a reliable way to score a raise—and, for now, those with a job are choosing to hold onto it at all costs.