The Democrats might control both the White House and Congress, but that hasn’t much helped Big Labor. In fact, private sector membership is falling.
The number of union workers in the U.S. employed by the government for the first time outnumbered union ranks in the private sector last year, the result of massive layoffs that plunged the rate of private sector union membership to a record low.
Local, state and federal government workers made up 51.5 percent of all union members in 2009, up from 48.7 percent a year ago, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday.
Overall, union membership declined by 771,000 workers, to 15.3 million. But with the number of nonunion workers also shrinking, the rate of union membership fell only slightly to 12.3 percent of all workers from 12.4 percent in 2008.
Private sector union membership plummeted by 10 percent, while government unions posted slight gains.
The labor lobby has proposed to get rid of organizing elections as one solution (the Orwellian “Employee Free Choice Act”). Even that likely wouldn’t be enough to save Big Labor.
Only in government–monopoly public services–are unions advancing. Which is what one would expect from organizations which typically promote inefficiency and waste as a means of enriching their members.
