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The U.S. union membership rate—the percent of wage and salary workers who were members of unions—was unchanged at 10.7 percent in 2017. New York continued to have the highest union membership rate (23.8 percent), while South Carolina continued to have the lowest (2.6 percent).
State | Union membership rate | Number of employed union members |
---|---|---|
Alabama |
7.4% | 138,000 |
Alaska |
18.1 | 55,000 |
Arizona |
4.0 | 111,000 |
Arkansas |
5.1 | 62,000 |
California |
15.5 | 2,491,000 |
Colorado |
9.6 | 238,000 |
Connecticut |
16.9 | 278,000 |
Delaware |
10.7 | 45,000 |
District of Columbia |
9.8 | 34,000 |
Florida |
5.6 | 480,000 |
Georgia |
4.0 | 173,000 |
Hawaii |
21.3 | 129,000 |
Idaho |
4.8 | 35,000 |
Illinois |
15.0 | 827,000 |
Indiana |
8.9 | 266,000 |
Iowa |
7.0 | 104,000 |
Kansas |
7.8 | 101,000 |
Kentucky |
9.6 | 174,000 |
Louisiana |
4.4 | 78,000 |
Maine |
11.4 | 66,000 |
Maryland |
10.8 | 299,000 |
Massachusetts |
12.4 | 401,000 |
Michigan |
15.6 | 658,000 |
Minnesota |
15.2 | 411,000 |
Mississippi |
5.3 | 59,000 |
Missouri |
8.7 | 226,000 |
Montana |
11.9 | 50,000 |
Nebraska |
8.2 | 70,000 |
Nevada |
12.7 | 164,000 |
New Hampshire |
11.3 | 72,000 |
New Jersey |
16.2 | 630,000 |
New Mexico |
6.7 | 52,000 |
New York |
23.8 | 2,017,000 |
North Carolina |
3.4 | 145,000 |
North Dakota |
5.1 | 18,000 |
Ohio |
12.5 | 635,000 |
Oklahoma |
5.5 | 84,000 |
Oregon |
14.9 | 262,000 |
Pennsylvania |
12.0 | 665,000 |
Rhode Island |
16.1 | 78,000 |
South Carolina |
2.6 | 52,000 |
South Dakota |
5.4 | 20,000 |
Tennessee |
5.7 | 155,000 |
Texas |
4.7 | 543,000 |
Utah |
3.9 | 54,000 |
Vermont |
11.0 | 32,000 |
Virginia |
4.6 | 176,000 |
Washington |
18.8 | 584,000 |
West Virginia |
11.0 | 75,000 |
Wisconsin |
8.3 | 230,000 |
Wyoming |
6.0 | 15,000 |
In 2017, 27 states and the District of Columbia had union membership rates below the U.S. average, 10.7 percent, while 22 states had rates above it and 1 state had the same rate.
Nine states had union membership rates below 5.0 percent in 2017, with South Carolina having the lowest rate (2.6 percent). The next lowest rates were in North Carolina (3.4 percent) and Utah (3.9 percent). Two states had union membership rates over 20.0 percent in 2017: New York (23.8 percent) and Hawaii (21.3 percent).
State union membership levels reflect both the employment level and the union membership rate. The largest numbers of union members lived in California (2.5 million) and New York (2.0 million). Over half of the 14.8 million union members in the U.S. lived in just seven states (California, 2.5 million; New York, 2.0 million; Illinois, 0.8 million; Michigan and Pennsylvania, 0.7 million each; and New Jersey and Ohio, 0.6 million each). These states accounted for only about one-third of wage and salary employment nationally.
These data are from the Current Population Survey. To learn more, see "Union Members — 2017" (HTML) (PDF). The numbers exclude all self-employed workers.
Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, The Economics Daily, New York again had highest union membership rate, South Carolina the lowest, in 2017 at https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2018/new-york-again-had-highest-union-membership-rate-south-carolina-the-lowest-in-2017.htm (visited October 31, 2024).