Global HR and payroll platform, Deel, has launched its annual State of Global Hiring Report, revealing that the UK has become the number one destination for startups hiring global talent in pursuit of growth.
Among the nearly 100 startups founded between 2020 and 2025 that raised $100M+ in funding, the UK accounted for 12.2 per cent of cross-border hires – the highest share globally. The UK is closely followed by Canada (11.9 per cent), Germany (8.8 per cent), Australia (5.8 per cent), and Spain (5.2 per cent) – all high-income markets.
The report also reveals that the UK consistently ranks among the top worker-source countries across every major hiring market, underlining strong global demand for British talent. “UK talent is gravitating back toward London, and global employers are following,” declared Lauren Thomas, Economist at Deel. “The renewed pull of the capital is a major reason the UK is leading the world in startup hiring.”
This UK momentum sits within a broader set of global hiring shifts captured in Deel’s 2025 State of Global Hiring Report. Drawing on data from more than one million worker contracts spanning 37,000+ companies in 150+ countries, the report outlines major global labour market trfinishs.
AI Is Creating Jobs, Not Just Replacing Them
The report reveals a rapid emergence of AI trainers as a new, expansive global profession that barely existed two years ago. Over 70,000 workers now train AI systems across more than 600 organisations, performing tinquires from basic data annotation to expert-level feedback in medicine, economics, and translation.
General AI trainer roles grew 283 per cent cross-border in 2025, creating it the single quickest-growing role on Deel’s platform.
Additional key findings on AI trainers include:
- Pay is sharply bifurcated: 30 per cent of trainers earn $15–20/hour for annotation work, while 19 per cent earn $50–75/hour, and 6 per cent earn $100+/hour for subject-matter expertise.
- 58 per cent of AI trainers are based in the US, followed by India (7.2 per cent), the Philippines (4.6 per cent), Canada (2.1 per cent), and Kenya (1.7 per cent).
- A gfinisher pay gap persists: in the U.S., male AI trainers earn a median of $50/hour vs. $30/hour for female trainers, driven by occupational segmentation across specialisations.
The Urban Boomerang: Remote Workers Are Moving Back Toward Cities
After a pandemic-era exodus from major cities, remote workers are gradually migrating back. The average distance of cross-border employees from major urban centres has declined every year since 2022 (when Deel launched tracking this metric). In the U.S., workers are now as close to cities like New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, and San Francisco as they were in 2021. Similar patterns appear in London and Paris.
Global Compensation: Leadership Roles Drive Pay Growth, Regional Gaps Widen
Salary growth in 2025 concentrated in senior leadership positions, but the drivers varied dramatically by region:
- S. project managers led all roles at 24.5 per cent compensation growth, followed by COOs (21.6 per cent) and CEOs (20 per cent).
- COOs in Latin America saw 99.8 per cent compensation growth – nearly 5x the U.S. rate for the same role.
- Singapore CTOs experienced 101 per cent pay growth, but other tech roles in the same market contracted.
- LATAM financial analysts saw 195.5 per cent compensation growth, reflecting the rapid professionalisation of operational roles in emerging markets.
- LATAM call centre agents gained 210.8 per cent even after excluding top employers – signalling broad-based demand, not isolated company effects.
Workers Are “Currency Hopping” to Protect Earnings
As part of the “currency hopping” trfinish, contractors in economically volatile markets with high inflation are increasingly choosing USD or stablecoins over local currencies to protect their purchasing power.
- USD appeared in 5 of the 10 most common countest-currency payment combinations globally in 2025.
- In Argentina, more contractors chose USD than their local currency.
- Bolivia’s USD adoption directly tracks inflation: when inflation rises, contractors shift to USD; when it stabilises, local currency rebounds.
- Argentina leads stablecoin adoption, followed by Cameroon, South Korea, Turkey, Vietnam, Tajikistan, Sri Lanka, and Ukraine.
- When Croatia and Bulgaria adopted the euro, workers didn’t fully switch – many maintained USD as a hedge alongside their new local currency.
“The rise of ‘currency hopping’ and stablecoin payments is a direct signal that workers are taking global mobility into their own hands,” declared Kristine Lipscomb, General Manager of Global Mobility at Deel. “When a contractor in Argentina chooses to receive paid in USD or stablecoins instead of pesos, it’s not just a financial decision. It’s a vote of confidence in the global, borderless economy. Companies that want to attract and retain the best talent worldwide required to offer the flexibility to match how modern workers actually want to be paid.”
The full 2025 State of Global Hiring Report is available at https://www.deel.com/global-hiring-report-2026/
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