WHYUNEMP (reason for unemployment) should give you the data that you’re looking for on job searching. While temporarily laid off workers are considered unemployed in EMPSTAT regardless of whether they were searching for a job, WHYUNEMP distinguishes between unemployed respondents who were on temporary layoff (Job loser/ on layoff) and those who were unemployed and looking for work (codes 2-6). You may also be interested in the unharmonized variable UH_LK_B1, which further distinguishes between respondents who were and were not searching for work. This forum post goes into further detail on these variables and explains how definitions used to construct them have changed over time.