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Organized Labor Today

• Union membership– Approx. 15.5% of the nation’s workers belong to unions– AFL-CIO

• The largest union with approx 9 million members• Includes actors, barbers, construction workers,

carpenters, retail clerks, musicians, teachers, postal workers, painters, steel and iron workers, firefighters, bricklayers, newspaper reporters

– Teamsters• Independent labor organization with approx 1.4 million

members

– United Auto Workers (UAW)• Represents employees in the automobile industry with

approx 640,000 members• Part of AFL-CIO

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Organized Labor Today (cont’d)

• Membership trends– Union membership has declined steadily since 1980

– Heavily unionized industries have been decreasing or not growing as fast as nonunionized industries

– Firms have moved from unionized areas (Northeast, Great Lakes region) to less unionized areas (Southeast, Southwest)

– Largest employment growth is in service industries, which are typically not unionized

– Some companies are moving manufacturing to other (less unionized) countries

– Management is providing benefits that reduce employees’ need for unionization

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Organized Labor Today (cont’d)

• Union-management partnerships– The adversarial nature of past union-management

relations has given way to limited cooperative partnerships between unions and companies

• Companies gain increased productivity, improved quality, and reduced costs

• Workers gain increased response to their needs, more decision-making opportunities, less supervision, more responsibility, and increased job security

• Unions gain credibility, strength, and increased membership

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