Pandemic’s Disruptive Path Still Haunts the Unemployed June 28, 2021 Fallout from the pandemic is discouraging a significant number of unemployed southwestern Pennsylvanians from looking for work, even as businesses reopen and COVID cases decline, according to a recent survey. Caring for children, dependent older adults and others was the most common reason for not looking for work that was given by unemployed workers who are not retired. Residents of 10 southwestern Pennsylvania counties are surveyed monthly by the Allegheny Conference on Community Development and Schmidt Market Research to gauge consumer confidence, personal finance and other issues during the pandemic. The latest survey, done in May, sheds some light on a pandemic phenomenon: Although jobs are steadily returning and the unemployment rate is shrinking, the region’s workforce is struggling to add workers to fill the hole left when the COVID pandemic forced tens of thousands out of a job.