Has the pandemic permanently changed job requirements?

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Requirements Survey publishes information on job requirements in four areas: education and training, cognitive and mental requirements, physical demands, and environmental conditions. This article reports on an examination of whether the pandemic led to changes in job requirements measured in this survey. Increased use of teleworking is evident, but the other job requirements do not generally show statistically significant changes since the onset of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic. The Occupational Requirements Survey (ORS) is a survey of establishments in private industry and state and local government conducted by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Sponsored by the Social Security Administration because of that agency’s responsibility for disability adjudication, ORS publishes information on job requirements in four areas: Job requirements information is currently being collected over a 5-year reference period, 2019–23.