Rich, educated Americans are suddenly the most scared about losing their jobs

White-collar workers are anxious about job security. But their concern is outrunning the actual pace of layoffs

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In March 2020, fears about unemployment spread evenly across the American workforce. Every income bracket, every education level, and every age group expected the same collapse. The pandemic made almost no one feel safe.

Unemployment expectations have climbed again, but this time the fear is concentrated among educated, higher-income Americans, the group that has historically felt most insulated from it. This shift amounts to a kind of class shock, hitting millions of workers who never expected to feel this exposed.

The New York Fed has been tracking that exposure for more than a decade, running its Survey of Consumer Expectations every month since 2013. This spring, the reading it produced blew past 43%, the clearest sign yet that the fear isn't fading.

The rise of white-collar unemployment worry

The New York Fed has asked the same roughly 1,300 households every month since 2013 how likely they think a higher unemployment rate is a year out, then averaged their answers into what it calls the Survey of Consumer Expectations.

The reading had already run hot for months before this spring's jump. It hit 41.8% in December 2025, nearly two points above its own year-long average. A brief dip in February didn't last, and by........

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