U.S. Election Stress Spurs Surge in International Job Search

Key Takeaways

Every election season, frustrated Americans raise the prospect of "moving to Canada" if the final results aren’t their preferred verdict. Following Election Day this year, Glassdoor data shows that some Americans checked in on their job prospects outside of the United States. The share of job searches by U.S. job seekers for jobs abroad increased 122 percent week-over-week from 9 PM EST on Election Day through 9 AM the following morning.

This shift to searching abroad was partially driven by a large decrease in domestic job search, as Americans turned away from their job search to watch election results. However, a very clear increase in job searches abroad can be seen starting Tuesday evening and carrying on through Wednesday morning, when the results of the election were most unclear.

However, not every country saw the same increase in search interest from Americans. New Zealand saw the largest increase, with searches surging 561 percent week-over-week. Countries that saw a surge in searches were a mix of countries that have handled the COVID-19 pandemic well like New Zealand and Taiwan, neighboring countries like Canada and Mexico, Nordic countries like Sweden, Norway and Finland, and other developed European countries like Switzerland, Italy and Germany.

Week-Over-Week % Change in Job Searches by U.S. Job Seekers for Destination Country

Moving abroad is no small decision, especially during an ongoing pandemic when many countries may not restrict travel from Americans. Ultimately, job search abroad has returned to normal levels as most of the interest in moving abroad was temporary, but the election year tradition of aspirationally moving to Canada and elsewhere remains strong.

Methodology

Our analysis uses job searches performed by U.S.-based users on Glassdoor.com. Only searches with a specified target location are included, which are then aggregated up to the country level. Search data is analyzed from October 25 through November 7, 2020. Searched countries with an unusual increase in search activity were manually identified based on the week-over-week percentage increase in searches, focusing particularly on searches performed Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning and filtering out countries with a low volume of search interest.

Percent change statistics are for searches performed between Tuesday November 3, 2020 9 PM EST and Wednesday November 4, 2020 9 AM EST. This 12 hour period was when election results were most uncertain and thus saw the largest surge in searches abroad.