Keystone Today

A high unemployment rate and workforce shortages are currently hitting Pennsylvania, as local leaders try to figure out how to attract job applicants.

Pennsylvania currently has an unemployment rate of 6.9%, which is a higher than the June national average of 5.9%, according Pennsylvania Pressroom.

Gov. Tom Wolf (D) has reinstated the work-search requirement for collecting unemployment but has yet to opt out of the extra federal unemployment insurance benefits as many other states have, according to Keystone Today. 

The York Daily Record highlighted several businesses offering large signing bonuses in an attempt to attract applicants. Gene Barr, the President and CEO of the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business & Industry, called the current situation "a full-blown crisis." Barr alleged that the extra federal unemployment money is actively disincentivizing people from seeking jobs.

Barr wrote an op-ed earlier this year calling for pro-growth reforms and criticizing Wolf’s “typical government tax-and-spend proposals," according to TribLive. 

So far, 26 states have opted out of the extra federal unemployment insurance benefits, according to Yahoo! Money. 

Pennsylvania's total non-farming jobs were up 11,500 in June with jobs increasing in five of the 11 industry "supersectors" with the largest volume gain in government, according to Pennsylvania Pressroom. The largest drop in jobs was in construction: more than 4,000. 

All of the job categories remained below February 2020 (pre-pandemic) job levels, as of June 2021, according to state data. 

There was a positive trend, however, as Pennsylvania's civilian labor force, which is the number of residents working or looking for work, decreased by 2,000 over the month due to a drop in unemployment, which fell for the fourth consecutive month.