The union membership rate increased over the year in the public sector by 1.2 percentage points to 34.8 percent, reflecting a decline in total public-sector wage and salary employment (-391,000).
The overall decline in union membership is due in part to the changing job landscape. Service and healthcare jobs are some of the fastest-growing, but their unionization rates have not increased apace. The manufacturing sector, which historically has made up the majority of unions, has been on the decline for decades.
The number of employed union members has declined by 2.9 million since 1983. During the same time, the number of all wage and salary workers grew from 88.3 million to 133.7 million. Consequently, the union membership rate was 20.1 percent in 1983 and declined to 11.1 percent in 2015.
Union membership had been declining in the US since 1954, and since 1967, as union membership rates decreased, middle class incomes shrank correspondingly. In 2007, the labor department reported the first increase in union memberships in 25 years and the largest increase since 1979.
The average annual cost of union dues is $400, or about two hours of pay per month. There is a disinclination of unions toward the contingent worker. Unions want full-time dues payers.
While private-sector union membership fell from 9% in 2000 to 6.2% in 2019, it edged up slightly to 6.3% in 2020. Similarly, public-sector membership dropped from 36.9% in 2000 to 33.6% in 2019, then rose to 34.8% in 2020. Union membership rates in the private sector declined nearly every year since 1983.
The overall decline of union membership is partly the result of the changing composition of jobs in the US. Healthcare, restaurant, and hospitality jobs are among the fastest growing and, historically, these industries that have not had high unionization rates.
Several factors have contributed to this decline in the prevalence of union s . For one, the composition of the US economy has shifted. More people now work in service industries, which traditionally have lower rates of unionization, than in the past, when the bulk of US workers held manufacturing jobs.
What are three explanations for the decline in union membership? Manufacturing decline in U.S.; Rise of women in the workplace; Movement of industries to the South which is less friendly to unions.
Largest unions
| Name | est. | Members (approx) |
|---|---|---|
| American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees | 1932 | 1,459,511 |
| Teamsters | 1903 | 1,400,000 |
| United Food and Commercial Workers | 1979 | 1,300,000 |
| United Auto Workers | 1935 | 990,000 |
The prosperity of the 1950s was reflected in generally good times for the labor movement. ... Yet trade unions also lost some momentum during the late 1940s and early 1950s. Most of the new white-collar workers did not join unions, and labor's image was tarnished by a corruption scandal involving the Teamsters union.
Labor > Trade union membership: Countries Compared
| # | COUNTRY | AMOUNT |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sweden | 82% |
| =2 | Finland | 76% |
| =2 | Denmark | 76% |
| 4 | Norway | 57% |
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