EP 796 Are Labor Unions Gaining Back Their Power in America?
Labor Unions had immense economic and political power in the post WWII era through the early 1970’s. In the 1950’s a third of all private sector workers were members of unions. For a host of reasons that we explore in this podcast, all that changed and for the last 50 years unions have shrunk to about six percent of the private sector labor force. The public sector unions have bumped the overall number to more than 10 percent and have had a trajectory of their own. We focus most particularly in this podcast on the unionization efforts related to private sector workers which seems to be having a moment. Whether that’s because of labor shortages, the’ take this job and shove it’ attitudes as people reassessed their lives in the wake of Covid 19 or the friendly Administration in the White House over the last four years, there has been a change, best exemplified by successful unionization of workers in a VW plant in the South and a 70 percent approval ratings for unions by the general public. We will explore all of these issues and more with Andrew Wolf, assistant professor in the Department of Global Labor and Work at Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations, on this podcast.
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