Bureau of Labor Statistics

“Join the union, and you’ll make more money!”

It’s a common refrain for unions trying to sell employees on the virtues of union representation. And now, Labor Secretary Thomas Perez has joined the chorus, authoring a blog post entitled, “Stronger Together: Your Voice in the Workplace Matters,” in which he claims that workers represented by

According to Secretary of Labor Thomas E. Perez, a recent Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) report is evidence “that belonging to a union makes a powerful difference in people’s lives, providing greater economic security and helping them punch their ticket to the middle class” but data indicates union membership remains low.

Although the January 23

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports the nation’s overall union membership rate remained the same in 2013, at 11.3 percent of the labor force, but for the first time in five years, there are more union members in the private sector than in government.

The public sector union membership rate fell to 35.3 percent from