Employers focusing more on employee financial wellbeing, study shows

As many Americans struggle to keep up with the rising cost of living—housing, food, electricity, and other necessities—their financial stress in the workplace is attracting more attention.

In 2025, employers’ unease with their workers’ financial well-being has reached a new high: 48% of employees rated their concern a 9 or 10 on a scale of 1 to 10, according to a recent survey from the Employee Benefits Research Institute; this rate was 43% in 2024 and only 39% in 2023. In 2019, the year before Covid, this share was 22%.

Since 2022, “we’ve seen employers move away from retirement and toward day-to-day cost-of-living issues and budgeting and savings issues,” said Jake Spiegel, senior research associate at the Employee Benefits Research Institute.

“Employees are feeling the pressure of above-trend inflation,” Spiegel said.

Paycheck to paycheck

Although inflation has fallen to 2.7% annually since peaking at 9.1% in June 2022, overall prices have risen by more than 25% since 2020. consumer price index.

The result was a large portion of households whose budgets were constrained by high costs. More than half (57%) of employees live paycheck to paycheck, according to a 2025 survey of nearly 90,000 participants in Bank of America’s 401(k) retirement plans. Although wage growth has generally outpaced inflation in the last two years, this Income lags behind inflation in 2021 and 2022.

Employers interested in helping employees manage stress to reduce absenteeism or worker dissatisfaction are making greater efforts to focus on their employees’ financial well-being.

According to EBRI research, more than two-thirds (70%) of employers have participated in some type of financial wellness initiative by 2025; This rate was 59% the previous year. The study included responses from 406 benefits decision-makers at companies with at least 500 employees that offer financial wellness programs or are interested in doing so.

At the same time, a smaller share of employers say their efforts are making a “major impact”: 43% compared to 60% in 2024 and 73% in 2023.

Employers can take cues from their employees when evaluating the impact of their programs, he said.

“We see evidence in one of our other surveys that employees tend to be less optimistic than employers when it comes to rating the effectiveness of benefits,” he said.

Financial wellness design

The features of any financial wellness program vary from company to company. These may include benefits such as payroll advance loans, short-term loans through a third party, and access to emergency funds through private savings accounts or their 401(k)—either through a loan or financial hardship withdrawal.

Other times, it may involve offering seminars or webinars that focus on specific topics, such as budgeting, investing, or saving for retirement.

Additionally, 68% said their employees have access to financial advisors, and 46% said they offer access to financial coaches. Sometimes the company fully or partially covers the cost of employees meeting one-on-one with experts.

“Financial health [programs] Certified financial planner Uchechi Kalu, founder of Greenlight Financial Planning in Los Angeles, said one-on-one sessions are a strategic way to provide greater access to professionals who specialize in providing financial guidance.

Kalu works with a non-profit organization in Chicago; At this organization, employees can meet with him twice a year via video calls about financial problems they are facing. Workers pay $118 per session, with the employer covering half the cost, Kalu said. Having employers help pay for such sessions could make a difference in whether employees get the benefit, he said.

He provided guidance on a variety of financial topics, from budgeting to investing, from buying a home to covering overseas travel expenses.

“One-on-one conversations are when you reach out to people at critical moments and help them through their journey,” Kalu said.