Is the Path to Gender Pay Equity Through Unionization?
By Kay Steiger - Dec 3rd, 2008 at 12:51 pmA study (PDF) released this week by the Center for Economic and Policy Research shows that women joining unions has a big impact on increasing wages. Women in unions see an average increase of about 11 percent, or about $2 an hour. Women in unions are also more likely to have health insurance and pensions than women with four-year college degrees. Currently women make up about 45 percent of all unionized workers, and are on track to become the majority of unionized workers by 2020.
My guess is that this has a lot to do with unions having increasing power in traditionally female professions. Health care workers, for instance, have been targeted by organizers to unionize. Traditionally female roles like caregivers have long been subject to low pay and little thanks. By organizing these workers, women are gaining real earning power in what is a skilled profession, but has traditionally not thought of as such. Today, health care workers are one of Service Employees International Union (SEIU)’s main constituencies.
The idea behind unionization is for skilled workers to gain negotiating power–this is something women have traditionally been thought of ask lacking. So if more women join unions, they can take the power of collective bargaining to help close the gender inequality gap. Women in professions that don’t require higher education can actually earn more if they join a union.
CEPR’s report is fantastic and I’m really glad we’re talking about it. There’s an op-ed in the San Diego Union-Tribune on the same report (http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20081202/news_lz1e2matting.html), so this report has definitely drawn some serious attention. I also think that as women become greater participants in unions, so too will they become important decisionmakers–for instance, the head of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor is a woman, and a very powerful one at that.
December 3rd, 2008 at 2:19 pmPay equity isn’t the only reason for health care workers to unionize. Patients’ health and very lives are endangered by assigning nurses too many patients, with no regard for the illness acuity, and by assigning patients with very specialized care needs to nurses outside that specialty. It gets very scary when you know what’s going on.
December 4th, 2008 at 2:21 pm