NEW YORK–Credit unions that are hiring shouldn’t be surprised at how eager applicants are to be put on the payroll, as a new survey reveals Americans are feeling increasingly hopeless about their employment prospects.
The probability of finding a job hit a record low of 43.1% in December, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s latest Survey of Consumer Expectations, which it has been running since 2013.
The December survey also found respondents’ expectations of losing their job rose to the highest mean probability since April 2025, while the probability of those voluntarily quitting dropped to the lowest rate since July 2023, according to the Fed bank.
“U.S. employers’ hiring activity has slumped to recession-era levels in recent months. Economists have attributed this to high uncertainty (in part due to massive shifts in trade and immigration policy) that has paralyzed much business investment,” one analysis noted. “The labor market has stalled, and settled into a low-hire, low-fire gear. Long-term unemployment has risen, and wage growth has slowed, which has put increased pressure on lower- and middle-income Americans and contributed further to widening economic disparity.”
Report to be Released Today
Today, the Bureau of Labor Statistics will release the latest snapshot on the health of the US labor market – and economists’ estimates vary wildly over what should be expected for the final jobs report of 2025.
“Total job gains for 2025 are on track to be a meager 710,000,” Heather Long, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union, said in a statement. “That’s the worst hiring outside of a recession since 2003. Even 2010, on the heels of the Great Recession, was a better year for hiring than 2025.”
A Year of Uncertainty
Analysts noted that for much of the past 12 months, extremely high uncertainty (from sweeping policies such as those related to tariffs); dramatic shifts in the nation’s immigration flows; and, to a much lesser extent, companies testing the AI waters, have resulted in muted employment gains – or even outright losses – across most industries.
The lone exceptions have been health care – an industry growing as a result of an aging population – and leisure and hospitality, which has reaped some of the spoils from an increasingly bifurcated economy, the data show.
