Eileen McAnneny, president of the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, said unemployment levels are not expected to return to pre-pandemic levels until 2024. McAnneny noted that the pandemic has also pushed people out of the labor force, with 228,000 people having left the labor force entirely since March – which means they are neither working nor looking for work. There are also questions about the long-term impact of the pandemic – for example, if businesses permanently curtail business travel, hotels that rely on business travel will not recover.