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- Millions of Americans have quit their jobs, seeking new career opportunities or better pay.
- The Great Resignation isn't over yet; many people currently employed are considering quitting.
- According to a new report from Joblist, 3 in 4 current workers are actively thinking of leaving their jobs.
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
The Great Resignation shows no sign of ending any time soon.
Close to three-quarters of workers are actively thinking about quitting their job, according to a survey by job search site Joblist. The job site just released its third quarter report about the state of the US labor market, surveying over 26,000 respondents about things like how tough they feel the job market is, whether they have already quit, and their reasons behind quitting their jobs. One survey in particular included asking about 3,000 respondents if they're actively thinking about leaving their job.
That survey found that 73% of 2,099 respondents who answered this question on their employment plans are considering quitting. More than a quarter of these Americans said they would feel comfortable quitting their job without a new one lined up.
"The pandemic created a sudden, wide-scale opportunity for workers in all industries to take a step back from their daily work, reevaluate their employment situation, and consider other career options moving forward," Kevin Harrington, CEO of Joblist, told Insider in an email. "A significant percentage are clearly taking advantage. Although the pandemic initiated this reckoning, the Great Resignation appears to be a trend that is here to stay."
The hospitality industry had the highest share of workers thinking about quitting at 77%. In a separate September survey by Joblist of 495 respondents, 58% of hospitality workers said that they were planning to quit their jobs before the end of 2021.
Workers have been following through with their plans to quit, too. Around 15.5 million Americans have quit their jobs since April, data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) shows. The hospitality sector, which includes accommodation and food services, has been worst hit, with 5.1% of all workers in leisure and hospitality quitting their jobs in July, per BLS data. Retail trade has also seen a record high quit rate, as seen in the following chart:
Americans have quit their jobs for different reasons, ranging from looking for positions that pay more to deciding to quit a position that they thought about leaving before the pandemic. Some also want more job flexibility.
According to the Joblist report, low pay and "desire for a new career path" are two main reasons former hospitality workers said they would not return to the industry. Food service workers who left the industry during the pandemic told Insider that the industry has low pay and customers weren't always friendly.
"I believe workers are sick and tired of being underpaid, overworked, underappreciated by these companies, not being protected, having to risk their lives," Cristian Cardona, a former shift manager at a corporate-owned McDonald's in Florida, previously told Insider.
Some workers have been hopping between jobs in search of better conditions, too.
"It's almost turned into a gig economy," Brian Walusis, a long-term restaurant industry employee who has worked as a line cook and front-of-house manager, told Insider. "People are waking up and realizing, 'I don't have to be treated poorly, I deserve to be treated like a human being.'"
Robert Cvetkovski, CEO of Rhumcay Island Grille in Destin, Florida, told Insider that the hospitality industry had become "the bottom of the food supply chain." He said that staff had left the industry to work as drivers for Amazon or Uber, or in some cases as realtors, and that his restaurant had only around a third of the workers it needed.
"Our biggest challenge is retaining staff," Cvetkovski added.
Because of the tight labor market, workers are able to quit their jobs in favor of ones with better wages, benefits, and working conditions.
"The power balance is shifting more and more to the workers in this market. Employers will need to adapt in terms of compensation, benefits, schedule flexibility, and other employee needs in order to remain competitive," Harrington said in an email to Insider. "Otherwise, turnover will remain high."