As Dr. Kenyani Davis makes her rounds at the Community Health Center in Buffalo, New York, she is still trying to process it all, after a mass shooter murdered 10 members of the neighborhood she serves.

"It's a community that got affected, especially when you're talking about a hate crime," Dr. Davis said. "It was every emotion at once."

In the days that followed, her team got to work — something they have always done.

"If they needed us in a medical component, we were there," Dr. Davis said. "If they needed us as community leaders, we were there. If they needed us as friends, if they needed us just to create an open space, we were there." 

Across the city, other organizations recognized the need for mental health services, too. 

"We were in the crowd with the community in front of Tops praying, crying, just being there, an ear for them to to express themselves," said Melissa Archer, New York Project Hope program coordinator.

When it came to treatment, Archer, a psychiatric nurse practitioner, noticed people on the city's east side, made up of mostly Black residents, were hesitant to seek help.   

"People want to see people that look like them so that they don't have to explain certain things they feel," Archer said.

SEE MORE: What Buffalo, NY Is Like Two Months After Tops Mass Shooting

According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, only one in three Black adults with mental illness receives treatment.

The National Alliance on Mental Illness say that's mostly due to socioeconomic challenges, stigma surrounding mental illness and mistrust of the medical industry. Black people are often victims of health care bias when those providing the treatment lack cultural awareness.  

"I think one of these things that this event has shed light on and empower people to do is to speak the truth," Dr. Davis said. "When we were there, we had people saying, 'We are angry at White people."

For community leaders in Buffalo, that meant offering more counselors with shared experiences and cultures. 

Part of the healing process means meeting people where they are, and for some mental health professionals, that meant setting up shop two minutes from where the incident took place.

The Buffalo Urban League team says the numbers have increased since moving into the neighborhood and making more Black counselors readily available, all thanks to temporary funding from FEMA through New York Project Hope.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the number of racial/ethnic minorities within the psychologist workforce more than doubled between 2000 and 2019, increasing 166%. However, researchers predict that increase will still be inadequate to meet the demands of minority patients.

In the meantime, doctors there say they'll continue to stand in the gap for as long as possible.

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SOUTH BURLINGTON, Vt. — Mike Jenne takes his job as a van driver seriously; so seriously that he even lets his riders pick the music.

"I'm getting used to country music. That's not really my favorite, but I'm getting used to it," he laughed.

Every day, he drives his van more than 100 miles, helping a particular group of folks get to and from their jobs. A group that Jenne himself is a part of.

"I was having trouble finding the job because when I was younger, I did a bunch of things that I wasn't supposed to be doing, and a lot of people wouldn't accept the things that were on my record," he said.

Jenne is one of 77 million people in the country that have an arrest or conviction on their record. According to the US Chamber of Commerce, the unemployment rate for this population is 27% and 60% for folks up until four years after their release.

"I've since, I fixed those problems, and now, they're not an issue, but companies don't really understand that," he said. "That sort of hurts your pride."

These numbers are significant, but so are the statistics of our current labor shortage.

The Chamber says there are more than 10 million open jobs right now, but only 5.8 million unemployed people. Thanks to a number of factors, including pandemic-spurred early retirement and parents staying home due to a lack of child care, we're short 4 million people to fill jobs.

"It's just better to meet people where they're at and feel that they don't have to compromise their personal needs for their work needs," said Daryn Forgeron, who is a staff member at Working Fields.

It's a unique staffing agency in Vermont that helps folks with criminal records, or people struggling with homelessness, addiction mental illness, get on the right path to finding a job, with both community resources and peer support.

Historically, it's been tough work, but over the last year, they've noticed more employers asking for help.

"We've seen it kind of on the large scale in terms of just employers are more ready to partner with us. I think in the last year alone, we signed 35 new clients, which is incredible," she said. "There's more willingness to understand what we're talking about. There's a more openness of mind in terms of, 'Oh yeah, of course, there are people who are ready to work. I need them right now.'"

Tapping into a once-shunned workforce is good for business. The Center for Economic and Policy Research says that refusing to hire people with criminal records shuts the country out of up to $87 billion in annual GDP.

Eighty-five percent of HR leaders say second-chance hires perform the same or better than other employees.

"They'll show up as better work workers. They will be loyal, they will be punctual, they will be the things that you want when they can also be individually fulfilled," Forgeron said.

Jenne not only drives people who got a job through Working Fields to their jobs, but he also got back on his feet because of them. To him, it's way more than being about a company's bottom line, having someone take a chance on you is about building back up.

"I told them my situation and where I'm coming from, and they encouraged me and actually helped me recover," he said.

"We see you as a human being and not just the story that's been told about you... and employers are more willing to see that and employers are more willing to support that, and when they do, that person can build the life that they want and that is enormous," said Forgeron.

Our past is a part of our story, but for the people who believe it shouldn't always dictate our future, they hope that this pattern of employers taking chances on more folks continues well past the current worker shortage.

"Don't just look at the bad things. Look at their accomplishment, you know, just look beyond the mistakes," said Jeanne.

BUFFALO, N.Y. —

Starbucks workers have voted to unionize at a store in Buffalo, New York, over the company’s objections, pointing the way to a new labor model for the 50-year old coffee giant.

The National Labor Relations Board said Thursday that workers voted 19-8 in favor of a union at one of three locations in Buffalo. The board is still counting votes for two other stores.

If the labor board certifies the vote — a process expected to take about a week — it would be the first for any Starbucks-owned store in the U.S. to unionize. Starbucks has actively fought unionization at its stores for decades, saying its stores function best when it works directly with employees.

Workers watching the vote count over Zoom on a big screen at a union office in Buffalo erupted into cheers and chants of “Elmwood, Elmwood, Elmwood!" when the results of that location were announced, jumping up and down and hugging each other.

Workers at all three stores began voting by mail last month on whether they wanted to be represented by Workers United, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union.

The National Labor Relations Board began counting ballots Thursday from union elections held at the stores. Around 111 Starbucks workers were eligible to vote by mail starting last month.

“Yes” votes could also accelerate unionization efforts at other U.S. Starbucks stores. Already, three more stores in Buffalo and a store in Mesa, Arizona, have filed petitions with the labor board for their own union elections. Those cases are pending.

Union backers at the first three Buffalo stores filed petitions with the labor board in August seeking representation by Workers United, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union. Those workers say Starbucks’ stores had chronic problems like understaffing and faulty equipment even before the pandemic. They want more input on pay and store operations.

“We have no accountability right now. We have no say,” said Casey Moore, a union organizer who has been working at a Buffalo-area Starbucks for around six months. “With a union we will actually be able to sit down at the table and say, `This is what we want.’”

Starbucks insists its 8,000 company-owned U.S. stores function best when it works directly with its employees, which it calls “partners.” Many employees in the Buffalo area work at more than one store depending on demand, Starbucks says, and it wants to have the flexibility to move them between stores.

Starbucks asked the labor board to hold one vote with all 20 of its Buffalo-area stores, but the board rejected that request, saying store-by-store votes were appropriate under labor law.

In a letter to Starbucks’ U.S. employees this week, Starbucks President and CEO Kevin Johnson reiterated the company’s wish to include all Buffalo-area stores in the union vote.

“While we recognize this creates some level of uncertainty, we respect the process that is underway, and independent of the outcome in these elections, we will continue to stay true to our mission and values,” Johnson wrote.

Johnson also reminded employees of the company’s generous benefits, including paid parental and sick leave and free college tuition through Arizona State University. Late last month, the company also announced pay increases, saying all its U.S. workers will earn at least $15 — and up to $23 — per hour by next summer.

But backers of the union say Starbucks can do more.

“If Starbucks can find the money to pay their CEO nearly $15 million in compensation, I think maybe they can afford to pay their workers a decent wage with decent benefits,” said U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent, in a recent Twitter post. Sanders held a virtual town hall with Buffalo Starbucks workers earlier this week.

Johnson earned $14.7 million in salary and stock awards in the company’s 2020 fiscal year.

Starbucks or the union can contest individual votes in the election, which could delay the certification process by the labor board. But if the votes do get certified, Starbucks is legally obligated to begin the process of collective bargaining with Workers United and any of the three stores that vote to unionize, said Cathy Creighton, the director of Cornell University’s Industrial and Labor Relations Buffalo Co-Lab.

In some cases, companies have closed a location rather than deal with a union. But that's difficult for a retailer like Starbucks, since it would be illegal to close one store and then open another nearby, Creighton said.

Starbucks has shown a willingness to bargain outside the U.S. In Victoria, Canada, workers at a Starbucks store voted to unionize in August 2020. It took Starbucks and the United Steelworkers union nearly a year to reach a collective bargaining agreement, which was ratified by workers in July.

The union votes come at a time of heightened labor unrest in the U.S. Striking cereal workers at Kellogg Co. rejected a new contract offer earlier this week. Thousands of workers were on strike at Deere & Co. earlier this fall. And the U.S. labor board recently approved a redo of a union vote at an Amazon warehouse in Alabama after finding the company pressured workers to vote against the union.

Labor shortages are giving workers a rare upper hand in wage negotiations. And Dan Graff, director of the Higgins Labor Program at the University of Notre Dame, said the pandemic gave many workers the time and space to rethink what they want from their jobs.

About 10,000 members of the United Auto Workers union went on strike against farm and construction equipment maker John Deere early Thursday morning.

The UAW had reached a tentative agreement on a new six-year contact with the company two weeks ago, only to see 90% of the rank-and-file members of the union reject it in a ratification vote that concluded this past Sunday. Union and management negotiators talked into the night Wednesday trying to reach a new deal but were unable to do so.

This is the nation's largest private-sector strike since the UAW waged a costly six-week strike against General Motors two years ago. And it continues a recent trend of workers flexing more muscle as the dynamics of the labor market tip more toward them and away from employers. Businesses have been struggling to find the workers they need to fill a recent record number of job openings. There has also been a record high number of workers quitting jobs.

Last week, 1,400 members of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union went on strike against Kellogg, shutting plants where cereal brands such as Rice Krispies, Raisin Bran, Froot Loops, Corn Flakes and Frosted Flakes are made.

And earlier Wednesday, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees — which represents technicians, artisans and craftspersons in the entertainment industry — announced it had set a strike deadline for early Monday morning if they could not reach a new contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers for 60,000 film and television workers. The union said that 98.6% of members had voted to authorize a strike if there is no new deal by then.

Video below: Kellogg addresses strike in new vide

However, the U.S. Labor Department reports that the number of strikes so far this year is actually down compared to the same period of 2019, the year before the COVID-19 pandemic riled labor markets.

Overall wages are up, as it appears that employers — both unionized and nonunion — are more willing to give workers what they want to keep them on the job.

Good times at Deere

The strike at Deere & Co., the formal name of the company popularly known as John Deere, shuts operations at 11 factories in Illinois, Iowa and Kansas, and three distribution centers in Georgia, Illinois and Colorado. The company makes both agricultural and construction equipment. Demand for its products has been strong.

The company said in August that it sees growing orders through the rest of this fiscal year that runs through Nov. 1, and into the first fiscal quarter of next year.

The rejected contract for UAW members at John Deere would have given them immediate raises in their base pay of 5% to 6%, and additional wage increases later in the contract that could have increased average pay by about 20% over the six years of the rejected deal. It also eliminated a second lower tier of pay for some more recent hires of the company, bringing them up to the pay of other UAW members.

The average production worker at Deere made about $60,000 last year, and could end this contract earning about $72,000.

Among the features of the rejected contract was the return of a cost of living adjustment — once a common feature of union contracts that has become rare in recent years. But it could have been lucrative at a time that inflation is running at levels not seen for decades. It also included improvements in benefits, including an enhanced retirement bonus of up to $50,000.

But unlike the last two UAW contracts at Deere, which were negotiated during difficult times for the company, these negotiations took place at an especially good time for the company.

That might have made reaching an agreement that membership would embrace more difficult. The current financial success at Deere may have led some of the union members to believe they deserved an even better package than the one that was rejected, especially after less lucrative deals in the past.

Revenue for the first three quarters of Deere's fiscal year rose to $32.7 billion, up 11% from the same period of 2019 ahead of the pandemic. Net income soared to a record $4.7 billion, up 84% on the same basis. The company was able to do so while dealing with many of the supply chain issues dogging the auto industry, and it was able to raise its outlook for full-year profits to as much as $5.9 billion.

The company has been hiring during the last year as well, as union-represented jobs at Deere climbed 19% since Nov. 1 of 2020.

Shares of Deere are up 23% year-to-date, although Wednesday's close was off 16% from where shares stood in early September.

Video above: NYC teachers' union protests vaccine mandate

The biggest victory for U.S. unions since Labor Day last year wasn't at the negotiating table, on the picket line or in organizing a vote. It was in the 2020 presidential election.

In Joe Biden, organized labor has the most pro-union president since at least Lyndon Johnson, or perhaps ever, depending upon who you ask.

And unions are actually more popular now than they've been since their heyday. A survey by Gallup released last week found that 68% of respondents have a positive view of unions — the best reading for that question dating back to 1965, and up from only 48% in 2009. Younger workers are even bigger backers of unions, with 77% of those 34 and younger having a positive view.

"I think because of the pandemic, the country has taken a second look at unions and they like what they see," said Tim Schlittner, communications director for the AFL-CIO union federation. "Workers are finding power in each other. And this is a moment of great opportunity for the labor movement to build on this momentum and grow our ranks."

There is also a generally more positive environment for workers today, with more job openings than job candidates resulting in rising wages in many sectors of the economy. But despite that, the very union-friendly administration and growing popularity, 2021 was once again a tough year for the nation's unions — which represent only a small sliver of U.S. workers and are having trouble growing their numbers.

"U.S. unions are in a much weaker position than they were in the 50s, 60s, 70s," said Alexander Colvin, dean of Cornell University's Industrial and Labor Relations School. "There's opportunities now to revitalize, but it's an opportunity, not a reality yet."

US union membership near record low

Unions ended 2020 with less than 11% of workers in their ranks, roughly half the share of U.S. workers than in 1983 when the Labor Department started tracking the figure.

And although that percentage was up slightly from a year earlier, that's only because non-union workers lost their jobs at a slightly higher rate during the pandemic than unionized workers. The number of union members actually fell slightly in 2020, the most recent year for which data is available.

The picture is somewhat better in the public sector, where roughly one-of-three government workers, such as teachers, police or firefighters, are members of a union. But in the private sector only 6% of workers are unionized. And changing that in a meaningful way is obviously going to be difficult.

The biggest recent setback was likely the failed attempt to win an organizing election at an Amazon warehouse in Alabama by the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union. Less than 30% of employees at the warehouse voted earlier this year to be represented by the union.

Union supporters claim this is a sign that the rules are stacked against them in attempts to organize businesses.

"There is a much higher share of workers who would want a union in their work place," said Celine McNicholas, director of government affairs at the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal think tank that gets 17% of its financial support from labor unions. "What the Amazon vote shows is how broken the system is."

Push for labor law reform

Unions are making a major push for a reform of labor laws through the Protecting the Right to Organize Act, or PRO Act, that union supporters say will level the playing field on representation votes. The legislation was recently renamed to add the name of Richard Trumka, the outspoken and charismatic president of the AFL-CIO who died a month ago.

The legislation would allow for fines of up to $50,000 against employers who are found to have violated employees' rights during an organizing campaign, such as firing them for supporting an organizing effort. The bill also allows the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to order an employer to recognize a union if it finds that management interfered with the election and a majority of employees have signed cards indicating they support a union.

But despite the fact that the legislation has passed the House and is co-sponsored by nearly all the Democrats in the Senate, it will be difficult to get it passed without eliminating the filibuster. Supporters are more hopeful parts of the bill can be included in budget measures that require only a simple majority of the Senate to pass.

Opponents of the measure say despite the difficulty of passing the law, they are concerned that parts of the legislation will come to pass in the Democrat-controlled Congress. Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, which fights efforts to require employees to pay union dues if they object to doing so, said despite unions representing only a tiny minority of workers, they still wield tremendous power in Washington.

"They have power out of all proportion to their numbers," he said. "They're a political force. To say the deck is stacked against them is just not true. They have the Democrats in their back pocket."

What Biden's win meant for unions

The wins that President Biden has provided to unions have been low-profile but important, including putting union-friendly appointees in charge of the NLRB.

Among the decisions the board will make soon is whether or not there will be a new unionization vote at the Amazon warehouse in Alabama. Last month an NLRB hearing officer agreed with union objections to several of the actions that Amazon management took during the previous vote, and recommended a new election.

Among the first day moves that Biden made upon taking office on Jan. 20 was firing Peter Robb as general counsel of the NLRB, a powerful position little known outside of labor law circles.

Robb, a longtime management-side lawyer, most notably served as the lead attorney in the watershed case after President Ronald Reagan fired the striking members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization in 1981, a move widely seen as a catalyst for management assault on unions.

Upon being named general counsel by President Donald Trump in 2017, Robb said he was committed not only to protecting the rights of employees to engage in union activities, but also the "rights of employees to refrain from such activities." Union opponents such as the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation saw him as their champion. His replacement, Jennifer Abruzzo, had previously been a union lawyer.

Biden has since named additional members to the NLRB, giving Democrats control of the board.

"There's a lot of stuff decided by the NLRB in terms of how labor law works that doesn't get a lot of attention," said Colvin. "It makes a big difference when you go from a pro-management to pro-union."

Opposition to Biden among rank-and-file

Despite the alliance between union leadership and many Democrats, 40% of voters from union households voted for Trump in the 2020 election, according to polling from Roper.

That's down only slightly from the 43% who voted for Trump in 2016, and roughly the same as the proportion who voted for Republican presidential candidates in the other elections this century. The AFL-CIO, which surveyed union members as opposed to voters from union households, estimates that 37% voted for Trump in each of the last two elections.

"That chasm between union officials and their agenda and the agenda of rank-and-file across the country are getting wider and wider," Mix said.

The Butler County Care Facility continues to struggle to find workers despite a raise in union wages as several management positions remain open, and the new federal vaccination mandate could complicate matters.

The county has spent about $554,000 this year on contracted front-line workers to man the county-owned nursing home. The commissioners have had a contract with Professional Review Network Inc. for a facility administrator and this week agreed to extend the contract on a month-to-month basis, it included an $85 per hour increase up to $200.

The county has paid $72,930 for the temporary administrator. Last year during the height of pandemic when vacancies soared the home paid $1.24 million for temporary workers.

The top job at the county-run nursing home — which pays between $84,223 and $124,800 — has been vacant since former administrator Chamika Poole resigned last October. County Administrator Judi Boyko told the Journal-News the hourly increase was included because Professional Review Network was “grossly undercompensated” under the previous agreement.

She needed a new month-to-month agreement in case she finds a new administrator soon.

“The county is continuously seeking candidates and evaluating qualifications for compatibility at the facility. Based on the greater market of health care candidates have been few and far between,” Boyko said. “I thought I had identified a candidate but terms couldn’t be reached.”

The director of nursing also recently quit and they have posted that position. Human Resources Director Laurie Murphy said there are 4 to 5 vacant nursing positions and 10 to 12 openings for front-line workers. She said they are hoping the pay raise in the recently negotiated union contract — from $13.35 to $15 per hour — plus generous county benefits will help them attract more job candidates.

“There remains an overall shortage of clinical workers in the healthcare field and the hiring challenges we face are not unique to the Care Facility,” Murphy said. “The global impact of the pandemic and recent uptake in the Delta variant cases continues to impact hiring and retention across the entire healthcare industry.”

The assistant nursing director and assistant business office manager positions are also open. Boyko said they are holding off on filling those jobs because the daily census of patients has dropped to less than half capacity at around 50 in the 109-bed facility. Because of strict nursing home restrictions during the pandemic, families were choosing to remove their loved ones from congregate care.

“Since the census now has been below 50 we’ve been maintaining that just from a business operations and funding perspective,” Boyko said. “Definitely we will replace the director of nursing and we’ll just continue to monitor to see if there is a void without an assistant director of nursing and assistant business office manager.”

Adding to existing staffing issues, President Joe Biden has tied Medicaid funding to mandatory vaccinations for nursing home employees. The county home’s main source of revenue is reimbursement from Medicaid for patient care. Murphy said it is too soon to predict the impact of the new directive.

“The mandate was just reported yesterday and the actual regulation has not been issued,” Murphy said. “We will certainly continue to monitor the impact of the mandate and its implications on county operations at the Care Facility.”

Commissioner Don Dixon, who is in the elderly care field, said he personally thinks it’s a good idea but believes it could cause a “whole lot of problems.”

Commissioner T.C. Rogers said he is also concerned about the mandate’s impact on the Care Facility, especially with what is going on in the area where hospitals have already mandated vaccines for their employees.

“I’m also concerned about all of our hospitals which have made vaccinations mandatory for their medical staff and doctors have told me that they’re short-handed now,” Rogers said. “Yeah I’m concerned.”

While businesses across the country are trying to incentivize people back to work, one Louisville restaurant decided to show its appreciation for its employees by sending them on vacation.

Ramen House Louisville, on Bardstown Road, posted Tuesday that it would be closing its doors temporarily not because of a shortage of workers, but because all of them will be in Las Vegas for the week.

According to the Facebook post, the restaurant closed for the week to fly the employees to Vegas to show them thanks for working "hard and diligently through all the crazy times" over the past year and a half.

"They deserve a break," the restaurant posted along with a photo of the employees at the airport.

In a message to WLKY, the owners of the Louisville restaurant that serves up ramen and rice bowls said 10 of their employees were flown out to Vegas. The trip also included having their lodging and some food and activities paid for.

Much like other restaurants and businesses in the metro, Ramen House was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. In March, the restaurant completely shut down, reopening later with restrictions in place.

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The Vegas trip isn't the first time the restaurant owners have gone out of their way to show appreciation for their employees. In April, the restaurant posted a photo of the group on a kayaking trip.

Check out the Ramen House Facebook page here.

While businesses across the country are trying to incentivize people back to work, one restaurant decided to show its appreciation for its employees by sending them on vacation.

Ramen House Louisville posted Tuesday that it would be closing its doors temporarily not because of a shortage of workers, but because all of them will be in Las Vegas for the week.

According to the Facebook post, the restaurant closed for the week to fly the employees to Vegas to show them thanks for working "hard and diligently through all the crazy times" over the past year and a half.

"They deserve a break," the restaurant posted along with a photo of the employees at the airport.

In a message to sister station WLKY, the owners of the Louisville restaurant that serves up ramen and rice bowls said 10 of their employees were flown out to Vegas. The trip also included having their lodging and some food and activities paid for.

Related video before: Customer leaves $16,000 tip at New Hampshire bar

Much like other restaurants and businesses across the country, Ramen House was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. In March, the restaurant completely shut down, reopening later with restrictions in place.

This content is imported from Facebook.
You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.

The Vegas trip isn't the first time the restaurant owners have gone out of their way to show appreciation for their employees. In April, the restaurant posted a photo of the group on a kayaking trip.

WASHINGTON (AP) — With the economy growing rapidly as it reopens from the pandemic, many employers are increasingly desperate to hire. Yet evidence suggests that as a group, the unemployed aren’t feeling the same urgency to take jobs.

Many people who are out of work are either seeking higher pay than they had before or are still reluctant to take jobs in public-facing service companies for fear of contracting COVID-19. How those two trends balance themselves out will likely set the pace for how many open positions employers can fill in the coming months.

On Friday, analysts expect the government to report that the economy added 675,000 jobs in June. That would be a substantial gain but nowhere near the gains that could be expected given the record-high number of job openings.

In fact, some economists have estimated that monthly job growth would be at least twice what the three-month average gain was for March, April and May — 540,000 — if there were no constraints on the number of workers available to fill jobs.

For June, the unemployment rate is projected to have dipped from 5.8% in May to a still-elevated 5.7%.

Total available jobs reached 9.3 million in April, the highest in 20 years of data, according to the Labor Department. The employment website Indeed has said that job postings have increased still further since then.

As the competition to keep and attract workers intensifies, especially at restaurants and tourist and entertainment venues, employers are offering higher pay, along with signing and retention bonuses and more flexible working hours. The proportion of job advertisements that promise a bonus has more than doubled in the past year, Indeed found.

The supply of potential hires is being held back by a variety of factors. Many Americans still have health concerns about working around large numbers of people. About 1.5 million people, mostly women, are no longer working or looking for work because they had to care for children when schools and day care centers shut down. And roughly 2.6 million older workers took advantage of enlarged stock portfolios and home values to retire early.

A temporary $300-a-​week federal unemployment benefit, on top of regular state jobless aid, may be enabling some people to be more selective in looking for and taking jobs. Roughly half the states plan to stop paying the supplement by the end of July in what proponents say is an effort to nudge more of the unemployed to seek jobs.

Economists at Goldman Sachs have calculated that in states that are cutting off the federal jobless payment early, the number of people who are receiving state jobless aid is declining faster than in states that plan to pay the $300-a-week benefit until it officially ends Sept. 6. That trend, which suggests could help boost hiring in June and in the subsequent months.

On Thursday, the government reported that the number of people who applied for jobless aid last week fell to 364,000, the lowest level since the pandemic began.

There are also signs that people are re-evaluating their work and personal lives and aren’t necessarily interested in returning to their old jobs, particularly those that offer modest wages. The proportion of Americans who quit their jobs in April reached its highest level in more than 20 years.

Nearly 6% of workers who are in an industry category that includes restaurants, hotels, casinos, and amusement parks quit their jobs in April — twice the proportion of workers in all sectors who did so.

Rising numbers of people quitting jobs, often for higher-paying positions, mean that even employers that have been hiring may be struggling to maintain sufficient staffing levels.

A survey of manufacturers in June found widespread complaints among factory executives about labor shortages. Many said they were experiencing heavy turnover because of what they called “wage dynamics”: Other companies are luring their workers away with higher pay.

Karen Fichuk, chief executive of Randstad North America, a recruiting and staffing firm, said that the Monster job board, which Randstad owns, found that job postings jumped 40% from May to June. Job searches, by contrast, rose just 4%.

“There is a significant gap between supply and demand,” Fichuk said.

The struggle to fill jobs coincides with a swiftly growing economy. In the first three months of the year, the government estimated that the economy expanded at a strong 6.4% annual rate. In the just-ended April-June quarter, the annual rate is thought to have reached a sizzling 10%.

And for all of 2021, the Congressional Budget Office estimated Thursday that growth will amount to 6.7%. That would be the fastest calendar-year expansion since 1984.

In the meantime, consumer confidence rose in June, according to the Conference Board, and is nearly back to its pre-pandemic level. Americans also seem undeterred by recent price increases, with the percentage of consumers who plan to buy a home, car or major appliance all rising. Home prices shot up in April by the most in 15 years.

Factory output is also expanding at a healthy pace, in part because companies are investing more in industrial machinery, aircraft and technology. Those investments could make workers more efficient in the coming years and boost longer-term growth.

It's been 15 long months since millions of workers left their offices and set up makeshift desks at home.

But as COVID-19 cases decline and more Americans get vaccinated, companies are beginning to establish protocols about how, and whether, office life will resume.

For Wall Street banks, the growing consensus is that everyone ought to be back at their desks by Labor Day — though Citibank said it's embracing more of a hybrid model. Meanwhile, tech companies are taking a far more flexible approach.

As for workers themselves, more than half of those surveyed in a recent Pew Research Center survey said that, given the choice, they would want to keep working from home even after the pandemic subsides.

Here's how some of the biggest names in tech and finance are handling the return to office life.

Apple

Apple expects employees to return to their offices three days a week come September, CEO Tim Cook wrote in an email to employees earlier this month, according to The Verge.

"For all that we've been able to achieve while many of us have been separated, the truth is that there has been something essential missing from this past year: each other," Cook said in the email. "Video conference calling has narrowed the distance between us, to be sure, but there are things it simply cannot replicate."

Employees are expected to be in the office Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays, but those with roles that allow for remote work will have the option to work from home Wednesdays and Fridays. The company is also offering up to two weeks of remote work annually and encouraging, but not requiring, vaccination.

Facebook

Facebook announced earlier this month that employees can apply for remote work if their role allows. Any worker who wants to return to the office may do so on a flexible basis but is encouraged to spend at least half of their time in the office. Employees will also be granted 20 days each year to work from a remote location.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg told employees in a memo that he plans to continue working remotely for at least half of the next year, a company spokesperson confirmed to CNN Business.

Google

Until September, Google workers around the world can continue to work remotely before deciding between coming back to their office, working out of a different Google office or applying for full-time remote work.

"The future of work is flexibility," CEO Sundar Pichai wrote in a May memo to employees.

Pichai said he expects about 60% of employees to return to their pre-pandemic offices while 20% move to a different office and 20% work from home.

Twitter

Twitter has yet to set an exact start date for welcoming employees back to the office, but it plans to start with a 20% capacity limit.

Early in the pandemic, the company said it plans to let some of its workforce continue working remotely "forever" if they choose.

"If our employees are in a role and situation that enables them to work from home and they want to continue to do so forever, we will make that happen," said Twitter's vice president of people, Jennifer Christie, in a statement to CNN Business. "If not, our offices will be their warm and welcoming selves, with some additional precautions, when we feel it's safe to return."

The company has stressed that it wants employees to have the choice to return to the office, but it anticipates that most workers will opt for a hybrid model, spending some time in the office and some time at home.

Uber

Uber will shift to a hybrid model in September, according to an April blog post from Nikki Krishnamurthy, the company's chief people officer.

Employees at the ride-hailing company are expected in the office three days a week, but they will have the option to work remotely the other two days.

"We feel that this combination of in-person and remote work will give people the freedom to do their best work while staying connected to their colleagues," Krishnamurthy said in the blog post.

Bank of America

Bank of America is encouraging, and expecting, all vaccinated employees to return to the office after Labor Day, CEO Brian Moynihan said this week.

"Our view is all the vaccinated teammates will be back," Moynihan said in a Bloomberg Television interview this week. "We'll be able to operate fairly normally and will then start to make provisions for the other teammates as we move through the fall."

The bank is not mandating employees to report their vaccination status, but it is expecting them to input their status in the company portal.

Citibank

Citi said in March that it recognized how people have benefited from aspects of working remotely, and that it would embrace some flexibility in the return-to-office process.

The bank said it expects up to 30% of U.S. staff to return to the office in July. The majority of Citi workers globally will be designated as "hybrid," working in the office at least three days a week and from home up to two days per week.

Goldman Sachs

Goldman Sachs welcomed employees back to the office on Monday. The company is expecting 5,400 newly hired interns, analysts and associates in the office in addition to its returning employees.

"We are focused on progressing on our journey to gradually bring our people back together again, where it is safe to do so, and are now in a position to activate the next steps in our return to office strategy," the bank's leadership wrote in a May staff memo.

Leading up to the return to in-person work, Goldman Sachs also mandated that its employees report their vaccination status. While vaccination is not required, the company is encouraging all staff to get vaccinated if possible.

JPMorgan Chase

Last month, JPMorgan opened all of its U.S. offices to employees with a 50% occupancy cap. Executives at the bank informed staff that it expects all U.S.-based employees back in the office by early July on a consistent rotational schedule, subject to the same 50% cap.

"We firmly believe that working together in person is important for our culture, clients, businesses and teams," JPMorgan executives said.

Morgan Stanley

Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman took a hard line earlier this week, saying he expects the bank's New York employees back in the office by Labor Day.

"If you can go to a restaurant in New York City, you can come into the office. And we want you in the office," Gorman said at an investing conference.

The company has not mandated vaccination, but Gorman noted that "well over 90%" of employees had already received their COVID-19 vaccination. That number is expected to hit 98% to 99%, according to Gorman.

The bank will continue to consider returning to the office on a case-by-case basis, Gorman said, recognizing that some employees may not be able to be vaccinated, or may be in a different situation if their office is outside of New York.

American employers added just 266,000 jobs last month, a sharp downturn from March. 

It's a sign businesses are struggling to fill open positions even as the country recovers economically from the pandemic. 

Construction companies and manufacturers, particularly automakers, slowed hiring last month due to parts shortages. 

Meanwhile, the hospitality sector, which includes restaurants, hotels and venues, is basically begging for workers. 

Lots of jobs are going unfilled because people have changed fields or left the workforce during the last year of the pandemic. And of course, some unemployed Americans are still afraid to go back to work due to the coronavirus pandemic and stubbornly high infection rates in certain parts of the country.

"Here we are in an empty dining room where normally, for lunch, we would be open and serving, you know, a couple of hundred guests," business owner Mac Hay said, "But this year, because of our staff shortage, both with U.S. workers but also workers from overseas, we've we can't fill the demand."

In response, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is calling on Washington to immediately stop paying Americans an extra $300 in weekly unemployment benefits. It's saying that boost is incentivizing some Americans to not return to work. 

The group also said the Biden administration's supplemental benefits means about 1 in 4 Americans is making more money unemployed than they earned while they were working.

This story originally reported by Gage Jackson on Newsy.com.