Meyerson WP: What happens if America loses its unions?

From June two years ago. Harold Meyerson is one of my favorites.

What happens if America loses its unions

What would America look like without a union movement? That’s not a hard question to answer, because we’re almost at that point. The rate of private-sector unionization has fallen below 7 percent, from a post-World War II high of roughly 40?percent. Already, the economic effects of a union-free America are glaringly apparent: an economically stagnant or downwardly mobile middle class, a steady clawing-back of job-related health and retirement benefits and ever-rising economic inequality.

.....When unions are powerful, they boost the incomes of not only their members but also of nonunion workers in their sector or region. Princeton economist Henry Farber has shown that the wages of a nonunion worker in an industry that is 25 percent unionized are 7.5 percent higher because of that unionization. Today, however, few industries have so high a rate of unionization, and a consequence is that unions can no longer win the kinds of wages and benefits they used to.

Deunionization is just one reason Americans’ incomes have declined, of course; globalization has taken its toll as well. But the declining share of pretax income going to wages is chiefly the result of the weakening of unions, which is the main reason American managers now routinely seek to thwart their workers’ attempts to unionize through legally questionable but economically rewarding tactics (rewarding, that is, for the managers).

The weakening of unions has had a huge political effect as well: the realignment of the white working class. Since the ’60s, exit polls have shown that unionized blue-collar whites vote Democratic at a rate 20 to 30 percent higher than their nonunion counterparts. The decline in union membership has weakened Democrats in such heavily white, increasingly deunionized states as West Virginia and Wisconsin — the main reason Republicans such as Walker have sought to reduce labor’s numbers. Liberals who have been indifferent to unions’ decline will find it difficult to enact progressive legislation in their absence.

Howard Dean once said this about unions and the strong middle class in America

We became a great country because we built a strong middle class. All Americans, not just union members, owe a debt of gratitude to the men and women of America’s labor movement. They grew the roots of our prosperity, and built a nation with blood, sweat and toil.

They struggled together to pass on to their children and grandchildren an America that was better than the one they inherited. The men and women of the labor movement joined together because they knew that they could accomplish more in unity than they could be going it alone. And if we are going to change America for the better, we must find in ourselves again that same sense of community and common cause.

It was this sense of community that was the foundation of the middle class and America’s shared prosperity. When companies did better, wages rose, and benefits kept pace. A strong labor union movement made sure that the factory worker and the sales clerk saw their real incomes rise.

Last year there was an article at Huffington Post about the unions and the middle class decline

This week the Census Bureau reported the latest depressing decline in middle-class incomes during the so-called economic recovery. But it may have missed an important factor in this story.

A report on Wednesday from the left-leaning think tank Center For American Progress notes that as middle-class incomes have steadily fallen, so have union membership rates. The middle 60 percent of households earned 53.2 percent of national income in 1968. That number has fallen to just 45.7 percent. During that same period, nationwide union membership fell from 28.3 percent to a record-low 11.3 percent of all workers.

....Young millennials' disenchantment with organized labor may also be an important contributor to its decline. From 2002 to 2012, union members ages 16 to 24 fell by 26 percent. That's double the decline in union membership for all workers, according to Quartz.

That said, younger generations may have a good reason to be less than eager to join a union. Studies have discovered that during the economic recovery, non-union workers fared considerably better than union workers in fields like manufacturing and private construction. Also, during the 1982 and 1991 recessions, states with fewer union members were found to recover more quickly than states with a strong union presence.

That last paragraph is part of research by The Heritage Foundation. I guess fewer union members means less hassle for stronger wages....and I guess they forgot to say that the new easier recovery means new jobs that pay less and less money.

I guess they mean that the recovery with smaller wages and no job security moves along a lot faster if nothing is slowed down by union negotiations.

Thus there is not as much disposable income, not as many contributing as much to Social Security...and thus seniors will have less to spend on retirement.