Quarantines will end. Remote work could be here to stay.

As the coronavirus pandemic forces millions of Americans to shelter in place, many are forced to do their jobs from home for the first time ever. And when all this is over, a lot of those workers would like it to stay that way.

In recent years, employees have increasingly sought out positions with remote working capability in addition to flexibility and generous amounts of time off in order to achieve a better work/life balance, according to a poll of more than 1,500 working adults conducted in 2019 by employee benefits provider Unum.

"I think a takeaway from this pandemic will be more people recognizing the value in remote work," said Liz Ahmed, the executive vice president of people and communications at Unum.

"It helps with business resiliency in unforeseen circumstances and also gives people more choice in when, where and how they work — and a lot of people value that," Ahmed said.

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Before the COVID-19 outbreak, only 7% of workers in the U.S. had access to a "flexible workplace" benefit, or telework, according to a report by the Pew Research Center based on data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics' most recent National Compensation survey.

Those workers were mostly managers, white-collar professionals and highly paid.

Naturally, remote work is less common in certain jobs that rely on face-to-face interaction, such as hair stylists, sales associates and restaurant servers, Pew found.

Yet, some have found a way.

Sonia Minetti-Sengos is a stylist and personal shopper at Neiman Marcus in New York's Hudson Yards. Before last month, business was booming at the newly minted department store on the West Side of Manhattan.