Thousands of tech workers in western Washington have been affected by recent layoffs at some of the largest tech companies in the world, including Microsoft, Google, Facebook, and Amazon, and layoff anxiety is running rampant.

Just this month, there have been at least 48,000 job cuts announced by major companies in the sector.

Microsoft announces next round of layoffs in Washington

SmartAsset, a personal finance company, ranked the U.S. cities with the most layoff anxiety using Google Trends data for 94 metros based on the average number of searches for the following keywords: layoffs, severance pay, recession, downsizing, unemployment, benefits, and furlough.

“We looked at Google Trends to get insight into what residents are searching for – and by extension, what they are anxious about – when it comes to layoff-related trends and assistance,” SmartAsset said in their study.

The Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue region ranked third in highest layoff anxiety. San Francisco-Oakland-Berkeley and San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad placed first and second, respectively.

“The Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue metro area, a tech hub that’s home to companies like Amazon and Microsoft, has the third-highest average search interest (42.67) for the six keywords related to layoff anxiety,” SmartAsset said. “’Recession’ had the most search interest out of the six phrases, followed by ‘severance pay’ and ‘layoffs.’ ‘Unemployment benefits,’ by contrast, is the least popular out of the six search terms.”

Inslee, lawmakers focus on workforce amid tech layoffs and shortage in other industries

According to 365 DataScience, tech companies laid off more than 150,000 employees in 2022 and another 68,500 in January 2023.

“Obviously, we want to help those people to the extent that they’re having a transition in their lives,” Inslee said in early January. “The good news is we still have a robust economy in the state of Washington, and we hope we’re going to keep them here and find them another opportunity.”