Over 1,000 people were polled by recruitment consultants Badenoch and Clark, who has been tracking happiness among office workers since 2007.
Last year prime minister David Cameron announced plans to measure the nation’s happiness, saying that GDP was "an incomplete way of measuring a country’s progress," and quoting former US attorney general, Bobby Kennedy, who told the University of Kansas in 1968 that GDP measured everything "except that which makes life worthwhile".
Workers defined as being in "key professional sectors’ were the least happy respondents. 35% of lawyers and a quarter of finance professionals said they were unhappy in their current role.
One in ten of those questioned said that the main reason they went to work was because of spiralling debt. Just over 20% said that they were predominantly motivated by routine. 30% said they were neither happy nor unhappy with work.
Heidi Waddington, associate director at Badenoch and Clark said: "Economic uncertainty over the past year has put tremendous pressure on employees.
"It is important that organisations foster an environment where their employees are able to develop a strong sense of self worth. Failure to do so may result in loss of talent, which in turn will lead to loss of potential revenue."
