Fast Facts
On the run? Here's what you need to know.
- Right-to-work means that unions can't require an employee be fired for declining to pay union dues or agency fees, while maintaining a union's ability to collectively bargain.
- Workers in right-to-work states make more. When adjusting for cost of living, workers in right-to-work states have 4.1 percent higher per-capita personal incomes than workers in non-right-to-work states.
- Right-to-work makes unions stronger. In 2012 union membership in non-right-to-work states fell by 396,000. In contrast union membership is right-to-work states grew by 39,000 (not including Indiana or Michigan.) This is because in right-to-work states workers have a choice, and unions must prove their worth in order to keep membership.
- Right-to-work offers in-state opportunities for young workers. Between 2000 and 2011, right-to-work states have seen an increase of 11.3 percent in the number of residents between the ages of 25-34, according to the Census Bureau. Non-right-to-work states, over that same period of time, have seen an increase of only 0.6 percent.
- Right-to-work means lower unemployment. It’s easier to find a job in a right-to-work state —the unemployment rate is a full percentage point lower than in forced-unionization states, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Between 2001 and 2011, right-to-work states added 1.7 million jobs while forced-unionism states lost 2.1 million jobs. Further, the vast majority of jobs created since the great recession ended have been in states with a right-to-work law. Since June of 2009 household employment growth in right-to-work states was two and a half times as much as non-right-to-work states; 4.4 percent compared to just 1.7 percent.
- In December 2012, unemployment in right-to-work states was 7.1 percent, but in non-right-to-work states it was 8.1 percent, and nationally was 7.8 percent.
