The hottest job markets in the country aren't in big cities. Instead, smaller metro areas look mighty at the moment.
Why it matters: The labor market is slowing down, particularly for white-collar professionals in tech-heavy cities.
Zoom in: The number of job listings in San Francisco declined 37% from February 2020 to October, according to new data from jobs site Indeed.
- Seattle had a 35% decline.
- Smaller markets, particularly those reliant on health care jobs, have remained more resilient.
Zoom in: Small metro areas that saw gains had labor markets more weighted toward health care, and leisure and hospitality, says Allison Shrivastava, an economist at Indeed Hiring Lab.
The big picture: Those two sectors accounted for more than 100% of net job gains in 2025 so far, Bloomberg recently reported.
Between the lines: The white-collar pullback is also partly due to Trump administration's job cuts and the hiring freeze in place for much of the year.
- The Washington, D.C., area has seen a decline of 24% in job listings — driven also by the White House drive to cut headcount and a pullback in government contracting work.
The bottom line: The job market looks a lot like the real estate market; it's all about location, location, location.
