Bad news for all of us
Assault on public sector associations and unions is starting to pay off; the numbers have dropped
Driven by widespread job losses in the public sector, the number of American workers belonging to a labor union has dropped to a record low, according to new data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Much of the precipitous fall in the public sector can be attributed to layoffs, particularly in public education and local government, where teachers and municipal workers are often unionized. Public-sector layoffs have been a major drag on the economic recovery, with more than half a million such jobs having vanished since the Great Recession began.
“It certainly suggests that the assault on public-sector unions that we’ve seen is starting to pay off for the people carrying out those activities,” John Schmitt, an economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, said. “What we don’t know is if these numbers reflect the beginning of a new regime where the public sector will look like the private sector.”
Although it’s too early to measure the impact, states such as Wisconsin and Michigan have passed laws seen as hostile to unions. In Wisconsin, Republican Gov. Scott Walker championed a law that rolled back the collective bargaining rights of public-sector workers. In Michigan, Republican Gov. Rick Snyder and state GOP legislators passed right-to-work measures for both the public and private sectors. Such laws forbid contracts between companies and unions that require all workers to pay the union for bargaining on their behalf, thereby weakening unions’ clout.
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