Losing a tech job in 2026 now costs laid-off software engineers nearly $14,400 per month, a 36% increase from 2021, driven by surging wages and healthcare costs that together have made each wave of tech redundancies more financially devastating than the last.
The figures come from an analysis by Insuranceopedia, which combined historical wage data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) with 2026 compensation estimates from salary benchmarking platform Levels.fyi, and factored in Affordable Care Act (ACA) marketplace premiums sourced from the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) to reflect the healthcare costs many laid-off workers must suddenly cover out of pocket.
The research found that the monthly financial shock of losing a tech job is now rising at nearly twice the pace it did before 2021. In the five years between 2016 and 2021, average monthly pay for software engineers grew by just 13%, while health insurance costs climbed 51%. Since 2021, both have surged in tandem, with wages rising 36% and healthcare costs jumping 38% over the same period, compounding the total financial blow workers absorb the moment employment ends.
Even accounting for inflation, the picture remains grim. After adjusting historical figures to 2026 dollars using Consumer Price Index data, the real monthly financial hit of losing a tech job still rose by roughly $1,250, or 9.5%, compared to 2021 levels. Against 2016 figures, the inflation-adjusted increase reaches nearly 13%.
The scale of job losses making this calculation matter is significant. In just the first five months of 2026, tech companies have laid off approximately 115,000 employees, putting the industry on pace to nearly match the full-year totals of 2025 and approach levels seen during the mass cuts of 2022 and 2024. Only the record-setting 2023 cycle, which saw more than 264,000 tech workers lose their jobs, has outpaced the current trajectory.
Industry observers point to artificial intelligence adoption, automation and the unwinding of pandemic-era overhiring as the structural forces behind the current wave of cuts. While large companies such as Meta and Google typically offer severance packages covering several months of pay and benefits, many smaller firms provide little or nothing, leaving workers immediately exposed to the full monthly cost the moment their employment ends.
The analysis underscores how the financial stakes of each new round of tech layoffs continue to climb, placing growing pressure on workers navigating one of the sector’s most turbulent periods in recent memory.
