State of the Unions

            This week President Obama advised us of the state of the union and last week the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor advised us of the state of unions.

            The data collected by the Department of Labor is part of the Current Population Survey which is a monthly sample survey of roughly 60,000 households.

            According to the Department of Labor release issued on January 22, the number of wage and salary workers belonging to unions declined by 771,000 to 15.3 million in 2009.  This equates to approximately 12.3% of the workers being union members whereas in 2008 that figure stood at 12.4%.  Obviously, the recession took its toll on all workers whether union or not.  Particularly hard hit in this recession were the manufacturing and construction sectors which experienced union job loses of 253,000 and 237,000 respectively.  Overall, 4.2 million jobs were lost in 2009 compared with 3.1 million in 2008.

            Contrary to conventional wisdom, union membership increased slightly each year since 2006.  It was in 2006 that union membership fell to 12.0% down from a high of 20.1% in 1983.  While private sector union job were reduced (as were non-union jobs) in 2009, unions added about 64,000 workers in government.  As a result, for the first time last year, a majority of union members was employed in government (52%).

            Education, training, and library occupations led the way with a unionization rate of 38.1%.  Among the states, New York and North Carolina led the way with the highest union membership.

            Labor Secretary Hilda Solis seized upon the results and in a statement issued January 22 reiterated the Obama administration’s support for the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act.  “As workers across the country have seen their real and nominal wages decline as a result of the recession, these numbers show a need for Congress to pass legislation to level the playing field to enable more American workers to access the benefits of union membership,” Solis said.  Rep. John Kline (R-Minn.) begged to differ calling EFCA a “threat to job creation” warning that Democrats would be “irresponsible” for pursuing this legislation.  Other interest groups ranging from organized labor to the Heritage Foundation opined about the statistics and how those statistics should influence policy coming from Washington.