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A new study of 1.3 million professionals finds that midcareer stalls are common, consequential—and preventable.
No promotion. No meaningful raise. Not yet 40. If that sounds familiar, it should—roughly one in four American professionals hits a wall in their careers before their supposed peak earning years, going at least five years without real upward movement in pay or title.
That's the central finding of a new study tracking 1.3 million midcareer professionals across industries since 2000, conducted by the Burning Glass Institute and NYU's School of Professional Studies. Even during the pandemic hiring boom, the phenomenon persisted. Now, with hiring slowing and major employers cutting management layers, it's only getting harder to break through.
"When you're talking about a quarter of the workforce, you're not talking about a niche problem."
— Matt Sigelman, president, Burning Glass InstituteWhich industries stall out most
Share of workers who hit a midcareer stall, by industry
Source: Burning Glass Institute
Public-sector workers stall at the highest rate—around 30%—partly because there are fewer senior roles to advance into. But the phenomenon cuts across industries, and it often starts earlier than people realize.
The early years are everything
Stalls rarely appear out of nowhere. Those who eventually plateaued averaged just 30% wage growth in their first decade of work, compared with 71% for those who kept progressing. That makes the early career—the years most workers spend grinding through junior roles—surprisingly decisive for long-term trajectory.
Erika Oberhansley, 41, has been an office manager in Garland, Texas, for seven years. Her company can't afford a raise. Her job search has mostly returned silence. "The landscape is awful," she said. She's since enrolled in a bookkeeping certification through Intuit, hoping to pivot into accounting. "Now more than ever, it's absolutely necessary."
The way out: adjacent pivots
The study found that targeted skill-building into adjacent roles—not dramatic career changes—offers the clearest path out. An office manager who transitions into business operations can redeploy most of what she already knows. A stalled programmer who picks up data science moves onto a track with more momentum.
Softer skills matter too: public speaking, time management, event planning, and community outreach. These capabilities, when sharpened and emphasized in job searches, measurably reduced stall risk.
"Rather than having one skill set, can I expand what I do and maybe get ahead?"
— Erich Eilenberger, digital communications professionalErich Eilenberger, 43, spent four years without a meaningful raise or promotion. When a senior role on his team opened up, he did the work but didn't get the offer. The following year, he reframed his job search—emphasizing fundraising and donor relationships alongside communications—and landed a new role at a different university.
The structural picture
Individual hustle only goes so far. A Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis report found that workers today are roughly half as likely to receive a better-paying outside job offer than they were in the 1980s, partly due to employer concentration in many markets. Fewer competing employers means less leverage—and fewer escape routes from a stall.
For some, the response is to stop betting on the ladder entirely. Sidi Traore, 28, works in legal compliance for a state agency and earned a real estate license to host open houses on weekends. "Job security is a fallacy," he said. "Why not bet on yourself?"
The researchers' conclusion is less dramatic but harder to argue with: a stall is increasingly the default, not the exception. The workers who avoid it are the ones who see it coming.