In the first uncertain quarter of 2025, as tech layoffs continue their steady beat and government job cuts reach levels not seen since past recessions, the job market is before us as a vast, uneven terrain. In February alone, U.S. employers announced job cuts exceeding 172,000, a 245 percent increase from January and the highest jump since the height of the COVID pandemic.
Employment is becoming incoherent, and yet amid this uncertainty, there are cities defying this like Raleigh and Austin, offering employment and growth.
Where Are The Jobs Going?
While tech hubs continue major layoffs—with at least 95,000 tech workers cut in 2024 and thousands more in early 2025 —several cities are rising as innovation centers with significant growth.
North Carolina
Raleigh, North Carolina stands out, “City of Oaks” is blossoming into a tech epicenter, with Apple and Google building campuses alongside other companies like Red Hat. Here Apple’s $1 Billion investment promises 3,000 jobs in software engineering, machine learning, and artificial intelligence. This area is surrounded by great universities like NC State, Duke, and UNC-Chapel Hill, supplying a great stream of talent, with this; Raleigh is projected to be a top tech hub on the East Coast.
Texas
Austin continues its ascendance despite broader tech industry contradictions, as it witnesses’ California’s slow surrender. “The Lone Star State added 75,000 new jobs within a 12-month period,” partly driven by companies relocating from California—including Oracle, Tesla, Meta, Amazon, and Apple. They leave California for reasons both stated and unstated, finding in Texas a landscape emptier, more permissive, and less burdened by regulation. This migration is creating the next top economy.
Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania is a force when it comes to employment, claiming the second spot on WalletHub’s rankings. The former industrial center has successfully reinvented itself, now offering the highest number of job opportunities per capita nationwide. Pittsburgh ranks third for full-time positions at highly-rated companies, with residents reporting the ninth-highest job satisfaction levels in the country, with a high amount of workers receiving employer-based retirement plans.
Places to Avoid
While some markets thrive, others continue to struggle. Memphis, Tennessee ranks as the worst city for jobs in 2025 according to WalletHub’s analysis, facing challenges in both job market factors and socioeconomic conditions. Detroit, Michigan, and San Bernardino, California also rank poorly, with Detroit suffering from the highest unemployment rate and lowest median annual income among surveyed cities on WalletHub’s analysis.
Government Experiences Significant Shifts
A total of 136,000 federal workers have been laid off, according to Layoffs.fyi, some of these have been through DOGE Layoffs and others through the “Deferred Resignation Program” on February 13, 2025. The federal government’s recent purge of thousands of workers has created ripple effects across multiple sectors. This trend is expected to accelerate as the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) pushes to reduce spending, with over 170,000 additional layoffs according to Layoffs.fyi.
Mass layoffs don’t just create ripples in the surrounding economy; when mass layoffs happen, they often leave remaining staff uneasy and uncertain, affecting the whole workflow and atmosphere with spiked tension.
Layoffs Today, Growth Tomorrow
Despite current layoffs, the Bureau of Labor Statistics projects tech jobs will grow significantly faster than average through 2033, with a projected 356,700 job openings annually.
“Even with the current tech layoffs, computing technology jobs are projected to grow from 6 million in 2024 to 7.1 million in 2034,” according to CompTIA’s “State of the Tech Workforce” report. This growth will not be distributed evenly, the cities mentioned above have positioned themselves to capture disproportionate shares of these employment opportunities.
In this current job market, location matters more than ever. The cities that have built diverse economies—offer the most promising opportunities amid continuing uncertainty.
Sources
- Reuters. (2025, March 6). “US announced job cuts surge 245% in February on federal government layoffs” https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/us-announced-job-cuts-surge-245-february-federal-government-layoffs-2025-03-06/
- Crunchbase News. (2025, March). “Tech Layoffs: US Companies With Job Cuts In 2024 And 2025” https://news.crunchbase.com/startups/tech-layoffs/
- Apple. (2021, April). “Apple commits $430 billion in US investments over five years” https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2021/04/apple-commits-430-billion-in-us-investments-over-five-years/
- Adam McCann. (2025, Jan 7). “Best Cities for Jobs” Wallet Hub https://wallethub.com/edu/best-cities-for-jobs/2173
- CNBC. (2025, March 6). “Layoff announcements soar to the highest since 2020 as DOGE slashes federal staff” https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/06/layoff-announcements-soar-to-the-highest-since-2020-as-doge-slashes-federal-staff-.html
- Reuters. (2025, March 6). “US announced job cuts surge 245% in February on federal government layoffs” https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/us-announced-job-cuts-surge-245-february-federal-government-layoffs-2025-03-06/
