The Bureau of Labor Statistics has released 2023 data, which finds that union membership is up in absolute numbers but continues to decline as a percentage of the workforce.
In 2022, the BLS found a total of 14,285,000 people were in unions and 16,002,000 people were represented by unions, constituting 10.1% of the workforce and 11.3% of the workforce respectively. These absolute numbers both grew in 2023—to 14,424,000 in unions and 16,193,000 represented by them—but as a share of the workforce these numbers are down another 0.1%. Going into 2024, just 10% of U.S. workers are in a union, and 11.2% represented by one.
Other noteworthy labor statistics, as provided by the BLS's writeup:
- The union membership rate of public-sector workers (32.5 percent) continued to be more than five times higher than the rate of private-sector workers (6.0 percent).
- The highest unionization rates were among workers in education, training, and library occupations (32.7 percent) and protective service occupations (31.9 percent).
- Men continued to have a higher union membership rate (10.5 percent) than women (9.5 percent).
- Black workers remained more likely to be union members than White, Asian, or Hispanic workers.
- Nonunion workers had median weekly earnings that were 86 percent of earnings for workers who were union members ($1,090 versus $1,263). (The comparisons of earnings in this news release are on a broad level and do not control for many factors that can be important in explaining earnings differences.)
- Among states, Hawaii and New York had the highest union membership rates (24.1 percent and 20.6 percent, respectively), while South Carolina and North Carolina had the lowest (2.3 percent and 2.7 percent, respectively).
In the public sector, both union membership and the union membership rate (32.5 percent) were little changed over the year. In 2023, the union membership rate continued to be highest in local government (38.4 percent), which employs many workers in heavily unionized occupations, such as police officers, firefighters, and teachers.
The number of union workers employed in the private sector increased by 191,000 to 7.4 million in 2023, while the unionization rate was unchanged at 6.0 percent. Industries with high unionization rates included utilities (19.9 percent), transportation and warehousing (15.9 percent), educational services (12.9 percent), and motion picture and sound recording industries (12.1 percent). Low unionization rates occurred in finance (1.2 percent), professional and technical services (1.3 percent), food services and drinking places (1.4 percent), and insurance (1.5 percent).
Eleven states had union membership rates below 5.0 percent in 2023. South Carolina had the lowest rate (2.3 percent). The next lowest rates were in North Carolina and South Dakota (2.7 percent and 3.6 percent, respectively). Two states had union membership rates over 20.0 percent in 2023: Hawaii (24.1 percent) and New York (20.6 percent).
