$9.6 trillion warning: Why disengaged employees are everyone’s business
$1.48 million every second.
That’s the staggering figure the world may be losing each second of working time to employee disengagement.
The new State of the Global Workplace 2025 report from Gallup reveals a workforce in flux, a deepening global productivity crisis, and an urgent call to action for leaders.
With engagement levels falling and managerial burnout reaching critical thresholds, Gallup estimates that low engagement is now costing the global economy $9.6 trillion annually.
At mentl, we took that figure and divided it by the globally accepted average of 1,800 working hours per year (as referenced by the World Bank, IMF, and the OECD). The result: a potential loss of $5.33 billion per hour.
That $9.6 trillion estimate from Gallup also equates to 9.1% of global GDP, based on 2023 World Bank data.
Engagement Levels Slip as Manager Burnout Surges
Only 21% of employees globally are now engaged at work revealed Gallup’s study, down from 23% the previous year. The decline mirrors the early COVID-19 disruption and represents a two-percentage-point drop that alone cost the global economy an estimated $438 billion in lost productivity.
A key driver of this fall? Managers, reveal Gallup.
Manager engagement dropped from 30% to 27%, with young and female managers experiencing the steepest declines. This is significant, as Gallup notes that 70% of team engagement is directly attributable to a manager’s influence.
“We are witnessing a pivotal moment in the global workplace—one where engagement is faltering at the exact time artificial intelligence is transforming every industry in its path,” wrote Jon Clifton, CEO, Gallup.
“The data show that employees — particularly managers — feel disconnected, which does not bode well for their preparedness for a future shaped by AI. And at the same time, the very tools that might boost engagement and performance are arriving with astonishing speed.”
Mental Health and Emotional Strain Continue to Climb
While engagement dropped, stress and loneliness continued to rise. Globally, 40% of workers report daily stress, and 22% report feeling lonely. In regions with the lowest engagement, these numbers skew even higher, especially for managers, who report some of the highest levels of anger, sadness, and burnout.
Disengagement in the GCC: A Costly Regional Challenge
In the GCC, disengagement is not just a corporate leadership issue—it’s an economic one.
Using the same GDP-based methodology applied by Gallup globally, but refining it with country-specific engagement rates, mentl can illustrate the potential regional costs to business. For example:
- Saudi Arabia, with a 26% engagement rate, could lose an estimated $85 billion annually to disengagement. That’s $48.6 million every hour.
- The UAE, also at 26% engagement, could see estimated losses of $43 billion annually, or $24 million per hour.
- Qatar (based on the Middle East’s 14% engagement) could lose around $20.5 billion annually, while Kuwait and Oman (18% and 27% engagement, respectively) each forfeit between $9.7 to $11 billion per year.
- Bahrain, with one of the lowest engagement rates at 16%, could incur an estimated loss of $4.3 billion annually, or $2.4 million per hour.
| Region/Country | Annual Cost (USD) | Hourly Cost (USD) |
| Global | $9.6 trillion | $5.33 billion |
| GCC | $122.0 billion | $67.1 million |
| Saudi Arabia | $85.0 billion | $48.6 million |
| UAE | $43.0 billion | $24.0 million |
Methodology
This analysis by mentl builds upon Gallup’s estimate that low engagement costs the world 9.1% of GDP. We began by applying this benchmark to each GCC country’s 2023 GDP (World Bank), then adjusted these figures using Gallup’s country-specific engagement rates from the 2025 report, comparing each to the global average of 21% engagement.
Hourly cost estimates were then calculated using regionally appropriate working hours per year, factoring in Ramadan, national holidays, and typical workweeks.
This model assumes a linear relationship between engagement and economic output, consistent with Gallup’s global methodology. We acknowledge that real-world variations by sector or marginal effects may alter the exact scale, but this approach offers a robust, GDP-aligned framework for estimating the economic burden of disengagement.
GCC in Focus: Stress, Anger, and Loneliness
The emotional well-being of employees in the GCC captured by Gallup continues to show how much room for improvement there is:
- Stress: In the MENA region, 52% of employees report feeling stressed on a daily basis—the highest globally, and 12 percentage points above the global average.
- Anger: Daily anger is reported by 32% of employees in the region, compared to a global average of 21%.
- Sadness: 26% of employees in MENA report experiencing sadness daily.
- Loneliness: Feelings of isolation are increasingly prevalent, with 22% of workers in the GCC saying they feel lonely at work.
This emotional toll is especially high among managers, who are asked to carry growing expectations with fewer resources and higher complexity, especially in post-pandemic hybrid and digital environments.
These emotional burdens aren’t just human concerns—they are economic ones. As Gallup’s data show, the relationship between engagement and well-being is tightly linked. Employees who are engaged are significantly more likely to be thriving in life overall and less likely to experience negative daily emotions.
A Time to Act
Gallup warns of a turning point: the tools to reverse disengagement exist, but many organisations need the will, investment, or understanding to deploy them.
The solutions lie in evidence-based manager training, mental health investment, and stronger human connection at work. With trillions on the line, and millions of hours lost, the question isn’t whether we can afford to invest in engagement.
It’s whether we can afford not to.
Source: Gallup, State of the Global Workplace 2025. GDP figures: World Bank (2023). Regional cost modeling and working hour adjustments by mentl.
