History of Union Busting in The United States - Post-1960s

Post-1960s

From 1960 to 2000 the percentage of workers in the United States belonging to a labor union fell from 30% to 13%, almost all of that decline being in the private sector. This is despite an increase in workers expressing an interest in belonging to unions since the early 1980s. (In 2005, more than half of unionized private-sector workers said they wanted a union in their workplace, up from around 30% in 1984.) And also despite the fact that in US neighbor Canada, where the structure of the economy and pro or anti-union sentiment among workers is very similar, unionization stayed steady. Canadian law, for example, allows for card certification and first-contract arbitrations (both features of the Employee Free Choice Act currently promoted by labor unions in the United States). It also bans permanent striker replacements, and imposes strong limits on employer propaganda." According to one source -- Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer--and Turned Its Back on the Middle Class, Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson -- a change in the political climate in Washington DC starting in the late 1970s "sidelined" the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). Much more aggressive and effective business lobbying meant "few real limits on ... vigorous antiunion activities. ... Reported violations of the NLRA skyrocketed ion the late 1970s and early 1980s. Meanwhile, strike rates plummeted, and many of the strikes that did occur were acts of desperation rather than indicators of union muscle."

According to David Bacon, "Modern unionbusting" employs company-dominated organizations in the workplace to forestall organizing drives.