Membership in unions by salaried workers fell to a record low of 10.3% in 2019, about two points lower than a decade ago, and about half the rate in 1983, The Hill reports.
According to data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Wednesday, union rates were highest among workers in education, training, library, and protective service occupations. Public-sector workers were five times more likely to be union members than private-sector workers, and men were slightly more likely to be in a union than women. Union workers earned $1,095 in median weekly earnings, 22.7% more than nonunion workers, who had a median salary of $892.
"The decline in union density is not surprising," said Kate Bronfenbrenner, the director of labor education research at Cornell University. "Despite the talk of a boom economy, the climate for organizing has become much more hostile in the last year under the openly anti-union Trump NLRB."
The data also shows more than half of all union members in the country, 14.6 million people, were located in seven states: California, New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Ohio, and Washington.
"The numbers reflect both the tremendously difficult barriers workers seeking to form a union continue to face and the unmatched resilience of working people in our desire to win bargaining power on the job," AFL-CIO acting Communications Director Tim Schlittner told the Hill.
Theodore Bunker ✉
Theodore Bunker, a Newsmax writer, has more than a decade covering news, media, and politics.
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