Unions don’t just improve workers’ paychecks—they shape the social and political fabric of the communities they operate in, lifting standards for union and nonunion workers alike.
Posted by AyronHalcyon
Unions don’t just improve workers’ paychecks—they shape the social and political fabric of the communities they operate in, lifting standards for union and nonunion workers alike.
Posted by AyronHalcyon
6 Comments
This sub ain’t gonna like this.
# Key findings
* In between 1979–2024, **median wages rose more in states where unionization declined less**.
* **The productivity–pay gap has grown more slowly in states with smaller declines in unionization** since 1979. In these states, it wasn’t just corporations and the wealthy who benefited from economic growth, but also working people, both unionized and non-unionized.
* **In high-union-density states, 2023 median household income was on average more than $12,000** higher than in low-union-density states.
* In recent years, **the average unemployment insurance recipiency rate in high-union-density states was 36.0%—double the 18.0% UI recipiency rate in low-union-density states**.
* In states with **higher union densities, the share of people without any form of health insurance was 5.7%;** this **rate was 9% in states with lower union densities**.
* **70.6% of states with the highest union density have enacted paid sick leave legislation**, compared with just **11.8% of low-union-density states**.
* **States with higher rates of unionization spend substantially more per pupil on education than low-union-density states** ($22,777 per pupil vs. $15,568).
* Since 2021, **low-union-density states have passed 44 voter restriction laws**, whereas **high-union-density states passed six such laws.**
In retrospect, Unions can be great or counterintuitive depending on the industry or field.
It’s an objective fact that union workers make more than non-union workers, but I’m wondering if this is survival bias.
At any time, several companies are on the brink, and a unionization drive can, and has, outright killed companies.
So do unions cause higher pay? Or can companies healthy enough to survive unionization afford to pay more?
Seems like this is more a blue state vs red state thing than a Union thing
A lot of the metrics they cited seem more a function of things like cost of living and political leanings rather than Unionization per se
I also don’t like that the metrics were for the overall community rather than things specific to unions
I just don’t see the causality here
I think that Democrats need to develop a mature view of unions. We treat them like these mythological divine heroes of the people sometimes, when they’re not. They’re a collection of workers trying to get a better deal for themselves, which is good, they have a right to it, and it’s benefitted workers in many ways, but at the same time, they’re not particularly good at setting policies, and we shouldn’t base policies solely on what they want. I’m a big supporter of the teachers union, my dad was a member while I was growing up, they’ve done a lot of good for teachers in America, but they’ve also supported some terrible education policy too. I support the UAW, I think they’ve done tons of good for manufacturing workers in America, but Shawn Fain’s trade policies would be disastrous, he was in favor of Trump’s tariff regime for example. I support the service workers union in Las Vegas, but their no tax on tips policy is bad as well. We have to be able to be supportive of unions and make sure workers have the ability to organize and join them without treating them like mystical heroes of the people that can do no wrong.