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It’s certainly not news that a huge proportion of us are deeply unhappy at our jobs. The statistics on burnout alone bear that out, and that’s before we even get into the economic issues. But a new study sheds light on not only just how widespread this unhappiness is, but the very simple and easily fixable reasons that are fueling it.

A study found 72% of employees want a new job within the next year.

The study was conducted in October 2024 by human resources software company isolved, and looked at more than 1,100 American workers in jobs at all career stages, from entry-level to the C-suite. What they found reveals just how very restless workers are at the moment.

Isolved found that 72% of workers are looking to move to a new job by the end of 2025, a 14% increase over the prior year. Perhaps even more surprising, a staggering 92% of those who’d already recently changed jobs were looking to do so again.

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The study found 4 main reasons why so many people want a new job:

These numbers are all pretty staggering, given the pitiful state of the current job market. Despite pretty consistently decent job numbers, everywhere you look, people are either getting laid off or reporting how impossible it seems to be to even get an interview, let alone land a new job. And that’s before we even get into the volatility of the economy overall. Isolved found that for most respondents, it came down to one of four reasons.

1. Better pay and benefits

No surprise here. We’re all looking for more money nowadays, especially since prices on everything have begun soaring amid the economic policies of the new administration. But interestingly, workers ranked benefits and salary on equal footing, with both comprising 24% of employees who say they are looking to jump ship.

Benefits cuts have been rampant in the business world in recent years. One 2024 study found that more than 1 in 4 companies had slashed benefits packages and 27% had even cut salaries. And while “extras” like tuition assistance are among the things that have been on the chopping block, so have basic benefits like health insurance and PTO. Accordingly, isolved’s analysis found that only 43% of employees have health insurance through their employer, and only 35% have PTO benefits at all in the first place.

2. Flexibility to work remote or hybrid

It’s certainly no secret that return-to-office mandates have been wildly unpopular, and unsurprisingly, a lack of flexibility is high on the list of factors motivating workers to seek a new job.

Ten percent said either a remote or hybrid schedule was the primary reason they were on the hunt for a new gig, which probably doesn’t seem like much. But isolved also found that when workers were asked what improvements would make them willing to stay at their current job, 39% said flexibility, second only to better pay and benefits.

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3. Worries about layoffs and lack of advancement opportunities

Unsurprisingly, workers are very worried about their careers hitting a snag. Nearly 6 in 10 said their current job does not have a clear enough path for advancement, and 18% said this is their primary motivator for finding a new job in the next year.

A similar proportion, 58%, said they’re worried about losing their job altogether, suggesting that a large number of workers see bad times ahead and are trying to jump ship before they land.

4. Disagreements with bosses or company leadership

The isolved research found that 11% of workers are hoping to transition jobs soon because they don’t like their boss or have fundamental disagreements with company leadership, and 16% said disagreements with their managers were the primary reason they left their last job.

It’s worth noting, of course, that all of the other above reasons motivating turnover are management issues too. It’s ultimately leaders who decide on the stingy pay and benefits packages, inflexible schedules, and ineffective approaches to development and advancement, making workers so disgruntled.

People don’t quit jobs, they quit managers, as the saying goes, and it seems like this data set bears that out. But there seems to be little will to improve on these things, despite how incredibly costly turnover is to companies: The full scale of recruitment, onboarding, and training typically costs 50% to 150% of a position’s salarydepending on the level.

For now, employers seemed to have banked on making workers miserable being more lucrative than treating and paying them fairly. But markets always change, and once it’s a worker’s market again? It sounds like a lot of companies are going to be in a lot of very expensive trouble.

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John Sundholm is a writer, editor, and video personality with 20 years of experience in media and entertainment. He covers culture, mental health, and human interest topics.