It’s now official: If you are a member of a union, you are more likely to work in government than in the private sector.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics has found that nearly 52 percent of all union members are now in government jobs. That is nearly a 3 percent jump from a year earlier, though total union membership in government and the private sector combined dropped from 12.4 percent to 12.3 percent.
Unionization of strictly the private-sector work force, meanwhile, is down to just 7.2 percent — which is why Big Labor wants Congress to pass a bill essentially robbing workers of the right to decide by secret ballot whether to unionize. Unions want workers to have to sign or not sign unionization cards in front of labor activists, opening the door for employees to be intimidated.
It is not really surprising that government unions have surpassed private-sector unions. For decades, union membership in the private sector has been falling. Many workers have been put off by union bosses’ heavy-handed tactics, and even some union members have been appalled to learn their dues were used for liberal political purposes.
Others resist unionization because they see unionized workers, especially in Detroit’s auto industry, losing their jobs in part because their unsustainable wage-and-benefit packages added too much to the cost of cars.
But with its power to raise taxes or borrow money to fund employees’ generous pay and benefits, government does not heed the free-market restraints that would otherwise keep compensation in line with what the market can bear. Government simply hands the bill to current and future taxpayers.
For instance, you might think that with the recession, government would stop hiring, or even slash payrolls. But with the $787 billion federal “stimulus” and expansion of government programs, government jobs have instead grown explosively — while millions of private-sector jobs have been lost. That means more government workers joining government unions, which in turn have more clout to lobby for more generous pay and benefits at taxpayer cost.
The irony of all this is that government employees — who are supposed to work on behalf of all the people — ought not to be unionized at all. But once again, union clout and pull have replaced common sense and good economics.