Growls

The Daily Caller reports today that “(u)nion membership dropped to a record low” in 2010, a drop of 612,000 workers in 2010. The report is based upon an analysis by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. When BLS first started measuring union membership about 30 years ago, unions represented 20% of the American workforce. According to The Daily Caller:

“Membership declined to 11.9 percent of the workforce in 2010, down from 12.3 percent a year earlier. In 2009, the unionized workforce lost 834,000 members, the steepest dip in membership rates ever recorded.

“The drop in union membership this year suggests the ongoing decline of organized labor combined with the impact of the recession that began in 2008 that rattled heavily unionized industries such as construction and telecommunications.

“In the private sector, unions only account for 6.9 percent of the workforce overall, a sharp divide from government workers, which is 36.2 percent unionized. Local government workers — teachers, fire fighters and police officers — represent the highest percentage of organized labor.”

While union membership in the private sector is approaching a single digit percentage, in government, union membership represents 36.2% of all public sector workers, according to Big Government’s blog today. Union members at the local government level is even higher:

“ . . . local government workers had the highest union membership rate, 42.3 percent. This group includes workers in heavily unionized occupations, such as teachers, police officers, and fire fighters.”

As LaborUnionReport closes out the Big Government post:

“Unfortunately, all of this may be too little too late as America’s economy and the politicians continue coming to grips with the costs of unionization.”

Well said!