The National Institute for Labor Relations Research (NILRR) has released a telling study comparing Right to Work states with forced-unionism states in a variety of statistical categories. The statistics, provided by various governmental departments and agencies as well as respected non-profits, show the stunning economic and personal benefits families enjoy from their states' popular Right to Work laws.

The last five years of available data shows that workers in Right to Work states not only enjoy higher non-farm private-sector job growth (9.1% versus 3.6% from 2003-2008), but their real personal incomes are also growing faster (15.8% vs. 9.1% from 2003-2008) and they enjoy a higher disposable income ($34,878 vs. $32,811 in 2008) than their counterparts in forced unionism states.

Families in Right to Work states also benefit from lower taxes and are more likely to buy a home, send their children to college, and gain private, employment-based health insurance for parents and children alike.

While Right to Work is about employee freedom in the workplace, NILRR's analysis shows that rolling back coercive union power has undeniable economic benefits as well.

To view the full details of NILRR's report entitled "Right to Work States Benefit From Faster Growth, Higher Real Purchasing Power -- 2009 Update," click here.

Last week, the pro-worker think tank National Institute for Labor Relations Research (NILRR) released a Fact Sheet entitled “Negative Employment Growth Since November 2001” that details how highly-unionized states are suffering a "lost decade" in terms of private-sector job growth, while the least-unionized states have benefited from a nearly 1.5 million private-sector job growth:

As of 2001, the year of the last national recession prior to the current one, 9.7% of private-sector employees nationwide were under “exclusive” union representation. But in 16 states – Alaska, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, Nevada, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania,. Washington, West Virginia and Wisconsin – 11.0% or more of private-sector workers were unionized.

From November 2001, the trough of the last recession, through June 2009, the most recent month for which non-preliminary, state-by-state payroll jobs data are available at this writing, these 16 heavily unionized states suffered an aggregate private-sector job loss of 990,000 – or 2.2% of their November 2001 total. Ten of the 16 states, or nearly two-thirds, had fewer private-sector jobs in June 2009 than they had had nearly eight years earlier.

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The overall job losses in states with average private-sector unionization were far smaller than in heavily unionized states, and the 16 states which had private-sector unionization of 6.0% or less in 2001 actually gained jobs.

These low union-density states are: Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah and Virginia. They gained an aggregate of nearly 1.5 million private-sector jobs from November 2001 through June 2009. That constitutes a 4.5% increase.

Even with recent setbacks taken into account, fifteen of the 16, or 94%, of the lowest union-density states have experienced net job gains since November 2001.

Putting aside the inherent abuse of workers' rights, the data clearly indicates that job growth is negatively impacted by Big Labor's government-granted monopoly bargaining special privileges.  Yet NILRR's findings should come to no surprise to regular Freedom@Work readers, as we reported recently:

NILRR recently found an especially strong correlation between a state’s Right to Work status and its job growth, while employees in Right to Work states are benefiting from faster job growth and higher real purchasing power than their compulsory unionism counterparts.

History clearly demonstrates how union monopolists have hindered the creation of new jobs with costly operating procedures and wasteful work rules, especially during times of financial hardship.  Meanwhile, union bosses use their monopoly bargaining and other special forced-dues privileges to fill their political coffers while proliferating Big Government-mandated regulations on job providers and higher taxes on employers and employees alike. 

Contrary to the usual propaganda union bosses would like you to believe, the National Institute for Labor Relations Research (NILRR) -- an anti-compulsory unionism think tank that exposes the harm forced unionism inflicts on workers -- released a report today entitled "Union Monopoly Linked to Lower Purchasing Power" that details how workers in least-unionized states enjoy the benefits of higher cost-of-living-adjusted earnings and disposable incomes.

You see, not only does government-granted union monopoly bargaining privileges infringe on employees' individual liberty, it also harms employees' economic interests.

According to NILRR:

As of 2008, according to economists Barry Hirsch and David Macpherson, 8.4% of private-sector employees nationwide were under “exclusive” union representation. But in 15 states -- Alaska, California, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey, Nevada, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania,. Washington, West Virginia and Wisconsin --10.0% or more of private-sector workers were unionized.

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In 2008, cost of living-adjusted average weekly earnings in the states with 10.0% or more of private-sector employees subject to union monopoly bargaining were $770.

That’s $48 less than the average in the states with private-sector unionization of 5.0% or less. (These low-union density states are: Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, New Hampshire, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and Virginia.) That comes to a roughly $2500-a-year disadvantage for full-time workers in states with high monopoly-bargaining density.

Aggregate cost of living-adjusted weekly earnings for states with private-sector union density of 5.1% to 9.9% were $783, or, for full-time workers, nearly $700 a year more than in the highest-union-density states, but more than $1800 a year less than in the lowest-union-density states.

NILRR also reports that "disposable income data tell the same story."

The economic benefits of voluntary union membership should come to no surprise to regular Freedom@Work readers, as we reported last month in "Compulsory Unionism Bankrupting States: Workers Flee to Right to Work States for Jobs":

NILRR recently found an especially strong correlation between a state’s Right to Work status and its job growth, while employees in Right to Work states are benefiting from faster job growth and higher real purchasing power than their compulsory unionism counterparts.

To view NILRR's fact sheet "Union Monopoly Linked to Lower Purchasing Power", click here.

This week, the National Right to Work Foundation received an anonymous letter from an American worker who has been a union member for 30 years and recently came around to supporting the Right to Work principle after witnessing horrific union boss corruption and government bailouts of forced unionism.

But after watching the auto industry go through bankruptcies and then STILL seeing the same corrupt practices go on, I feel like I am getting screwed TWICE!  Once as a taxpayer and once as a dues paying union member!

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In Right to Work states, union dues are paid only by those members who feel like they are being represented.  That would make the unions honest and do their jobs like they are paid to!

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I don't dare sign this letter.  The retaliation would cost me my job, my safety and my sanity!

I am not alone, there are many that feel this way but are too scared to speak up.

This anonymous writer offers a good reminder of what the Right to Work principle is all about -- true freedom in the workplace.  Read the full letter here.

As the current economic downturn continues, many states across the nation are starting to find it increasingly difficult to stay afloat after having capitulated to the union bosses' extortionate demands.  Last week, the Wall Street Journal cited the National Institute for Labor Relations Research (NILRR) -- an anti-compulsory unionism think tank that exposes the harm forced unionism inflicts on workers -- when discussing Big Labor's contribution toward the severe financial difficulties California, New York, and New Jersey are experiencing and the migration of workers leaving these forced-unionism states:

Powerful unions. Mr. Obama believes union power is a ticket to the middle class. The middle class is getting creamed in all three of these "progressive" states, where organized labor is king. The unionized share of the workforce is 20% in California, 19% in New Jersey and 27% in New York compared to 13% across the country. All three are non-right-to-work states, have super-minimum wage requirements and provide among the nation's most generous public-employee pensions.

Workers in these paradises are indeed uniting -- by leaving. New York ranks first, California second and New Jersey third in moving vans leaving the state. A study by the National Institute for Labor Relations Research found that over the past decade these and other high-union states (mostly in the Northeast) had one-third the job growth of states with low union penetration.

NILRR recently found an especially strong correlation between a state’s Right to Work status and its job growth, while employees in Right to Work states are benefiting from faster job growth and higher real purchasing power than their compulsory unionism counterparts.

Perhaps it's also worth revisiting a Wall Street Journal article penned late last year by National Right to Work President Mark Mix, reminding us that a massive expansion in forced unionism power played a key role in making the Great Depression longer and deeper.

As if there was ever any doubt about whether or not the federal government favors union bosses over individual employees (including union members and nonmembers alike), the National Labor Relations Board last week determined that union bosses may lie to employees about employers' contract proposals.

In a Division of Advice memorandum, NLRB Associate General Counsel Barry Kearney ruled that union chiefs do not commit an unfair labor practice when they misstate the details of a contract proposed by the company.

In the NLRB's twisted logic, union bosses can deceive the very employees it has the duty to fairly represent so long as the deception involves "wholly an internal union matter."

This is a textbook example showing just why Right to Work protections are so needed.  In 22 states with Right to Work laws, employees cannot be forced to join or pay dues to a union to get or keep a job.  When "representatives" deliberately lie to employees about contract negotiations, why should workers be forced to pay for this "service"?

Taxi Drivers Force Union to End Illegal Union-Dues Scheme

Union bosses illegally refused to allow drivers out of union membership, despite Nevada’s popular Right to Work law

Las Vegas, Nevada (May 13, 2009) — With free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, a cab driver working for the largest taxi business in Las Vegas forced a local union’s bosses to back down after they refused to allow him and his coworkers to exercise their right to refrain from formal, dues-paying union membership.

Late last year, Fred Haeberle and some of his colleagues at the Nevada Yellow, Checker and Star Cab Corporations attempted to resign from formal, dues-paying union membership with the Industrial, Technical, and Professional Employees (ITPE) union – a local union of the Office and Professional Employees International Union (OPEIU), an AFL-CIO affiliate.

ITPE union bosses maliciously refused Haeberle’s request – saying he had “no standing” to assert his rights. Haeberle then turned to the National Right to Work Foundation for free legal aid.

(Continue reading this news release...)

In this week's "Top 10 List" from Human Events, the staff of Human Events listed the "Top 10 Things On Big Labor's Agenda." The list is telling, as it describes Big Labor's outrageous plans to to grab more coercive power and erode employees' rights in the workplace. Of course, the so-called "Employee Free Choice Act", more accurately called the "Card Check" Forced Unionism Bill tops the list:

1. Employee Free Choice Act
In addition to the notorious “card-check” provision that strips union members of their right to a secret ballot, this bill also provides for increased penalties for employers who commit allegedly unfair labor practices...

Besides card check forced unionism, Big Labor is even toying with a relaunch of efforts to "Repeal...Section 14(b) of the Taft-Hartley Act [which] would take from states the right to enact Right to Work laws." Big Labor has wanted for decades to repeal this critical provision, and the most serious attempt to do so was in 1960s.

Not only is Big Labor trying to ultimately overturn laws in Right to Work states, but they "also seek the forced unionization of police, firefighters, and EMTs by federal fiat -- overturning the laws of more than two dozen states."

Other notable aspects of Human Events' "Top 10 List" includes Big Labor's nefarious plans of using the Federal government to force more employees into full dues paying compulsory unionism (see: #6, 7), concealing corruption (see: #8), and making it harder for employees to exercise their rights against the abuses of compulsory unionism (see: #9, 10).

Today, the Wall Street Journal editorialized on the fact that Big Labor “has won the intellectual battle for control of the Democratic Party and is reasserting its agenda in a way not seen since the 1970’s.” The WSJ notes Big Labor’s political influence, especially within the Democratic Party, has been steadily increasing over the years.

At the top of Big Labor's agenda is, of course, more compulsory unionism privileges to force workers into dues-paying union ranks:

[R]ewriting federal law to promote union organizing is now near the top of the Democratic agenda. The main vehicle is "card check" legislation, which would eliminate the requirement for secret ballots in union elections. Unable to organize workers when employees can vote in privacy, unions want to expose those votes to peer pressure, and inevitably to public intimidation. This would arguably be the biggest change to federal labor law since the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947. The Democratic House passed card check last year, and Mr. Obama has pledged his support. With a few more Senators, it might pass.

Card check is merely the start. Next on the agenda is a campaign to repeal "right to work" laws in the 22 U.S. states that have them. Right to work laws allow employees to decide for themselves whether to join or financially support a union. Former Michigan Congressman David Bonior told a union event in Denver on Monday that limiting right to work laws is essential both to lifting union membership and promoting more Democratic political victories.

The Daily Labor Report (subscription only) recently reported on an important win for National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys in the 9th Circuit Federal Appeals Court:

Upholding the National Labor Relations Board's January 2006 decision against Studio Transportation Drivers Local 399 of the Teamsters, the appeals court found that the union, which used the arbitration awards for nonrepresentational purposes such as political and charitable contributions, should exclude the money from its calculation of agency fees rather than use it to reduce its reported nonrepresentational expenses.

By spending the arbitration award money on nonrepresentational rather than representational expenditures, the union in effect increased the agency fees owed by the objecting nonmember for representational expenses, Judge Harry Pregerson wrote for the appeals court.

The win is important because it prohibits cooking the books to overcharge nonmembers who are forced to pay dues to union officials as condition of employment.

It is now even more clearly illegal for union officials to funnel revenue from sources other than union dues to pay for "non-chargeable" items – like politics, lobbying and members-only activities.   Using this scheme, union officials try to get away with charging a higher percentage of the remaining activities to forced-dues-payers.

You can be certain that as long as union officials can force employees to pay dues they will continue to develop schemes to maximize the amount of the dues they extract from unwilling workers.  Thanks to National Right to Work Foundation attorneys, at least this particular method of union discrimination is clearly illegal.