In cities and towns from coast-to-coast, there are countless Americans still looking for work. Among them is 57-year-old Leslie Schwimmer, who has been out of work since September.
"It’s very humbling. I’ve had to turn to resources that I’ve never turned to before," Schwimmer said.
Schwimmer is among the millions who lost her job at the start of the pandemic. She owned a spa in Ventura, Florida, but when the pandemic hit, she was forced to close. She was eventually able to reopen, but by then the damage had been done.
"The whole thing was gut-wrenching, beyond gut-wrenching. I put my life into it, sold my house, gave everything I put into that and I never thought it was an option not to succeed," she explained.
Back in September, the single mother of three suddenly found herself looking for work. Seven months later, this former executive still can't find a job.
Nationwide, the unemployment rate is sitting around 6.2 percent. The number of long-term unemployed, or people who have been jobless for at least 27 weeks, is right at 4.1 million. Half of those people though are over the age of 55.
"I do think age is a huge factor,” I try to mask my age as much as possible," Schwimmer said about the job searching process.
Nearly a year into her job search, answering the question, "How are you doing?" isn't easy.
"It’s hard on your self-confidence,” Schwimmer said. “It’s very hard."
But from LinkedIn to old-fashioned networking, Schwimmer is determined to find work and to find her way out of those unemployment statistics.