Union approval near 60-year high
To observe Labor Day—the holiday invented by conservative politicians and their friends in the labor movement to draw attention away from the militant history of May Day—Gallup released a poll on public attitudes towards unions.* For the fifth consecutive year, it shows approval close to the highest levels in 60 years—68%. It’s ranged between 68% and 71% since 2021. The graph below tells the history. When Gallup first asked the question in 1936±the year of the Flint sit-down strike—72% approved. Positive feelings sagged some during the 1940s, but rose back above 70%… Read More
Fresh audio product: the tariffs
Just added to my radio archive (click on date for link): April 3, 2025 Jason Wade of the UAW explains the union’s endorsement of Trump’s auto tariffs • Sam Gindin, author of this article and former long-time adviser to what used to be known as the Canadian Autoworkers Union, on what issues the tariff controversy obscures
More on union density: who and where
A follow-up to yesterday’s post about historical trends in union density. Today, a look at demographics and geography. Once upon a time, the stereotypical union member was a factory worker. That hasn’t been the case for a long time. In 2024, manufacturing accounted for 10% employment and only 8% of union membership. In 1983, the numbers were very different: 22% of employment and 30% of union membership. Last year, not quite 8% of manufacturing workers were unionized—higher than private services, where it’s under 6%—but that’s down hard from 28% in 1983. demographics… Read More
Unions lose some more
Here are the headlines for my last five writeups of the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ annual accounting of union density: Union density: yet another low (2020) Pandemic boosts union density (2021) Union membership resumes its fall (2022) Union density keeps falling (2023) Unions had a flat 2023 (2024). It’s not hard to detect a theme here: near-relentless decline. The only recent up year was 2021, which came about because more nonunion workers lost their jobs than union workers during the worst months of the pandemic, raising the density numbers. (Density is the… Read More
Fresh audio product: Vance, fake friend of the working class; American political parties are weird
Just added to my radio archive (click on date for link): July 18, 2024 Brandon Mancilla of the UAW looks behind the GOP’s pro-worker facade • Adam Hilton, author of True Blues, on the bizarre nature of the US political party system
Jane McAlevey: the Behind the News interviews
Jane McAlevey, the organizer, writer, and frequent BtN guest, died on July 7. To remember her, I ran an excerpt from a March 2017 interview with her. Here’s what I said to introduce the interview, and below that is a list of her appearances on the show. The dates are links to the entry in my radio archive. Jane McAlevey, the organizer, writer, and human dynamo, who appeared on this show nine times over the years, starting in 2012, died on Sunday, July 7, at the age of 59. I met Jane… Read More
Fresh audio product: nativist neoliberalism, the Alabama ruling class
Just added to my radio archive (click on date for link): May 9, 2024 Derek Seidman looks into the Alabama corporate elite and its terror at the incursion of the UAW (articles here and here) • Quinn Slobodian on Peter Brimelow and the white supremacist wing of neoliberalism (paywalled article here)
Fresh audio product: why did SA bring case against Israel, organizing amidst sprawl, the widening war in the Middle East
Just added to my radio archive (click on date for link): February 1, 2024 Sean Jacobs explores why South Africa brought the genocide case against Israel • Eric Blanc (Substack post here) on organizing in a scattered and atomized society • Hassan El-Tayyab on the widening war in the Middle East
Fresh audio product: perils of striking Trump from the ballot, a good year for labor
Just added to my radio archive (click on date for link): January 4, 2024 Samuel Moyn, law prof and historian, on the political and legal dubiousness of excluding Trump from the presidential ballot (article here) • labor journalist Alex Press on the year in labor (articles on that topic here and here)
Fresh audio product: UAW strike strategy, corps making money of publicly financed research
October 19, 2023 Stephanie Ross on the UAW’s innovative strike strategy against the Big Three automakers • Christopher Morten and Amy Kapczynski on how Corporate America profits off publicly funded research and how to stop them from doing that [apologies for lack of Gaza material—plenty due in coming weeks]
Fresh audio product: Chicago politics, Ukraine & Scandinavian neutrality
Just added to my radio archive (click on date for link): April 27, 2023 Jacobin editor Micah Uetricht explains how Chicago elected a progressive mayor, Brandon Johnson • Lily Lynch, editor of Balkanist and contributor to New Left Review‘s Sidecar blog on how the Ukraine war destroyed Scandinavian neutrality
Fresh audio product: Israel moves further right, Iran’s tripartite structure, Ontario labor upsurge
Just added to my radio archive (click on date for link): November 10, 2022 Joel Schalit on the return of Bibi Netanyahu in Israel, now in coalition with the religious right • Mohammad Salemy on the tripartite structure of the Islamic Republic of Iran • Megan Kinch, about a labor upsurge in Ontario
Fresh audio product: Italian politics, union finances
Just added to my radio archive (click on date for link): July 28, 2022 Paolo Gerbaudo on the failure of technocracy and the imminence of right-wing rule in Italy • Chris Bohner on the huge stash unions have but aren’t spending (report here, Jacobin summary here)
Quit rates, unions, politics
I’m not sure what this means, but quit rates are higher in states that voted for Trump, and are higher in states with low unionization rates. We’ve been hearing for some time now that quit rates are the highest on record. That’s true if you look only at the Job Openings and Labor Market Turnover Series (JOLTS) numbers, which the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) started reporting in December 2000. It had an ancestor, which the BLS reported for manufacturing only, covering 1919 to 1981 (left portion of the graph below). Current… Read More
Fresh audio product
Just added to my radio archive (click on date for link): February 17, 2022 Toronto-based activist and organizer John Clarke on the politics and personnel behind the Ottawa convoy • Dave Zirin on racism in the NFL (and Brian Flores’s lawsuit over it) • Justine Medina on working at Amazon and trying to unionize it
LBO News from Doug Henwood 