By GREGORY N. HEIRES
Although the labor movement has
increased its commitment to organizing, the long-term decline in union
membership continued in 2003.
Last year, the percentage of wage and salary workers covered by union
contracts dropped from 13.3 percent to 12.9 percent, according to the
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The number of union members decreased
by 369,000 over the year to 15.8 million.
The percentage of private sector workers in unions now stands at an
alarming 8.3 percent. In the public sector, the union density
rate is four times higher, 37.2 percent. Most of the new members in
the last quarter century are public workers. Union membership peaked
at 35.5 percent in 1945, and it remained above 30 percent throughout
the 1950s.
Factors explaining the decline in union membership include labor laws,
anti-union law firms and consultants that help employers thwart organizing
drives, the failure of many unions to buy into the AFL-CIOs shift
toward organizing, and global contracting out of manufacturing and service
work.