Overall

The share of US employees who are union members and the share who are covered by a union contract have both declined substantially over the past four decades (Figure 1). In 1983, 20.1 percent of workers were union members, and 23.3 percent were covered by a union contract. By 2010, union membership and coverage had fallen to 11.9 percent and 13.1 percent, respectively. In recent years, both measures reached historic lows. Membership declined to 9.9 percent in 2024 before ticking up to 10.0 percent in 2025, while coverage fell to 11.1 percent in 2024 and edged up to 11.2 percent in 2025. Throughout the entire period, the persistent gap between coverage and membership reflects the share of workers who benefit from union contracts without being union members.

Figure 1

The 2025 union membership and coverage estimates are based on only 11 months of survey data rather than a full calendar year. Survey data for October 2025 are unavailable due to the federal government shutdown, which interrupted data collection. As a result, the 2025 figures should be interpreted with additional caution, particularly when making fine-grained comparisons to prior years that reflect a full 12 months of data. While the 11-month estimates provide a useful and timely snapshot of unionization trends, they may differ slightly from what a complete year of data would show if October observations were available.

To assess what this limitation could mean, Figure 2 presents historical union membership and coverage calculated two ways: using 11 months of data that exclude October and using the full 12 months. For years where both measures are available, the two series track closely. Across the full period, the divergence between 11- and 12-month estimates is small, generally within 0.1 percentage points for both union membership and union coverage. The largest membership gaps occur in a handful of years such as 1991, 2001, 2010, and 2023, when the difference reaches roughly one-tenth of a percentage point. Coverage differences are similarly modest, with the largest gap appearing in 2023 at 0.1 percentage points. This close alignment suggests that excluding October has historically had only a minimal effect on overall union membership and coverage rates, providing some reassurance that the 2025 estimates, while incomplete, are broadly comparable to prior years. 

Figure 2

Union membership and union coverage counts have fallen markedly since the early 1980s, declining from roughly 17.7 million union members and 20.5 million covered workers in 1983 to about 14.5 million members and 16.3 million covered workers by the late 2010s (Figure 3). Both measures dipped further at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and then stabilized, with modest increases in recent years. In 2025, based on the 11-month sample, union membership rose to about 14.7 million and coverage to 16.5 million. Estimates based on 11 months and 12 months of data track closely in earlier years, with only small differences, suggesting that the exclusion of October has historically had little effect on overall membership and coverage counts.

Figure 3

In the private sector, union membership and coverage density in 2025 stood at 5.9 percent and 6.8 percent, respectively. This corresponded to about 7.4 million union members and 8.4 million employees with union contract coverage. Public-sector union membership density was 32.9 percent, and 36.4 percent of government workers were covered by a union contract. This corresponded to about 7.3 million members and just over 8 million covered workers in the public sector.

Union membership rates have long been far higher in the public sector than in the private sector, and this gap has persisted over time (Figure 4). In 1983, more than one-third of public-sector workers (36.7 percent) were union members, compared with 16.5 percent of private-sector workers. Private-sector unionization declined steadily over the following decades, falling below 10 percent by the late 1990s and reaching 5.9 percent by 2024 and 2025. Public-sector union membership has also trended downward, though much more gradually, remaining above 30 percent throughout the entire period. After peaking near 39 percent in the mid-1990s, public-sector union membership declined to 32.9 percent in 2025. 

Figure 4

The long-run decline in union membership has been driven primarily by steep losses in the private sector, while public sector unions have remained comparatively resilient. Private-sector workers still account for a larger number of union members than public-sector workers, though the gap has narrowed substantially over time (Figure 5). In 1983, there were just under 12 million union members in the private sector compared with 5.7 million in the public sector. By 2025, the 11-month estimates show approximately 7.4 million in the private sector and 7.3 million union members in the public sector.

Figure 5

Demographic Trends

Table 1 presents union membership and union coverage rates for 2024 and 2025 across major demographic and labor-market groups, including sector, gender, race and ethnicity, age, education, nativity, and disability status. The 2025 estimates are based on an 11-month sample that excludes October. The table includes both 11-month and full 12-month estimates for 2024, along with the corresponding year-over-year changes under each approach. This side-by-side presentation allows for a direct assessment of how closely the truncated 11-month measures track full-year estimates and provides context for evaluating recent changes in union membership and coverage in 2025. 

Table 1

Table 2 presents the same set of comparisons but reports the number of workers for each group, with figures shown in thousands rather than percentages. For additional context on how the exclusion of October 2025 may affect year-to-year comparability, the Appendix presents additional side-by-side comparisons of estimates over time based on 11-month and 12-month samples.

Table 2

Gender

Union membership and coverage remain slightly higher among men than women, with minimal differences between the 11-month and 12-month samples for 2024. In the 2025 11-month sample, 10.4 percent of men were union members compared with 9.6 percent of women. Both groups saw modest gains over the past year, with male membership increasing by 0.1 to 0.2 percentage points and female membership rising by about 0.1 percentage points. A similar pattern appears in coverage: men’s union coverage reached 11.6 percent in 2025, compared to 10.9 percent for women. Coverage increased more for men than for women, continuing a small but persistent gender gap in unionization levels.

While men have historically had higher unionization rates, the gender gap has narrowed considerably over the past four decades (Figure 6). In 1983, nearly one in four men (24.7 percent) were union members, compared to just 14.6 percent of women — a 10 percentage point gap. Over time, union membership among men has declined more steeply than among women. By 2025, the membership gap had narrowed to just 0.8 percentage points. 

Figure 6

The gender composition of union members has also shifted since 1983, when men made up two thirds of union members in the United States (Figure 7). In 2025, men made up 53.9 percent of union members. While union membership among men has declined steadily over the decades, women’s union membership has remained relatively stable and even grown in certain years.   

Figure 7

Age

Union membership density continues to skew older and has declined in every age group since the early 1980s (Figure 8). In 1983, union member density rose steadily with age, from 9.1 percent among workers ages 16 to 24 to 27 percent among those ages 45 to 64. Since then, younger workers have seen steeper membership declines than older workers. By 2025, union density among workers ages 16 to 24 had fallen to 4.7 percent — roughly half its 1983 level — while the share of union members ages 25 to 34 declined from 19.6 percent to 8.9 percent. Older workers remained more likely to be union members, though their rates have also trended downward, with union membership around 12 to 13 percent among workers ages 45 to 64 in 2025.

Figure 8

These patterns are also reflected in membership counts showing that union membership has become increasingly concentrated among older workers (Figure 9). Notably, the number of union members ages 16 to 34 fell from about 6.9 million in 1983 to just under 4 million in recent years. Losses were especially sharp among the youngest workers, with membership among those ages 16 to 24 dropping from about 1.7 million to below 1.0 million. In contrast, union membership among prime-age and older workers has remained more stable. Workers ages 35 to 64 accounted for approximately 10.7 million union members in 1983 and still number around 10 million today, despite modest declines in unionization rates. Membership among workers ages 65 and older, while still relatively small in absolute terms, has more than tripled since 1983. Together, these trends describe an aging union workforce shaped more by sharp declines among younger workers than by uniform losses across age groups. 

Figure 9

Race/Ethnicity

Union membership density has declined across all racial and ethnic groups since 1989, the first year that separate breakdowns were available for Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. Figure 10 shows union membership rates by race and ethnicity over time, using mutually exclusive race/ethnicity categories.¹ Black workers have consistently had the highest union membership rates, beginning at 22.1 percent in 1989 and declining to 11.2 percent in 2025. Despite this drop, Black workers remain more likely to be union members than other groups. White workers experienced a steadier decline, from 15.8 percent to 10.3 percent over the same period. Hispanic or Latino workers saw their membership rate fall from 15.2 percent in 1989 to 8.8 percent in 2025, with most of the decline occurring during the 1990s and early 2000s. Among Asian and Pacific Islander workers, unionization rates started at 15.8 percent and fell more steeply to 9.0 percent by 2025, with notable year-to-year volatility. While union membership remains highest among Black workers, the gap across groups has narrowed over time.

Figure 10

Meanwhile, membership counts have declined sharply among white workers while growing substantially among Hispanic and Asian and Pacific Islander workers, and remaining relatively stable among Black workers (Figure 11). In 1989, white workers accounted for roughly 12.8 million union members, compared with about 2.5 million Black workers, 1.2 million Hispanic workers, and just over 400,000 Asian and Pacific Islander workers. By 2025, white union membership had fallen to about 8.6 million. Over the same period, Hispanic union membership more than doubled to roughly 2.6 million, while Asian and Pacific Islander membership also more than doubled to over 1.1 million. Black union membership fluctuated over time but remained relatively stable in absolute terms, at around 2.2 million in 2025. As a result, even amid overall union decline, the union workforce has become more racially and ethnically diverse.

Figure 11

Nativity

Between 2024 and 2025, union membership increased by 0.2 percentage points among US-born workers and fell by about the same for foreign-born workers. Union coverage increased and fell, respectively, by similar amounts among both groups. The number of US-born union members increased by over 400,000 between 2024 and 2025, while the number of foreign-born union members fell by between 4,000 and 28,000, depending on the sample used for 2024. However, the number of foreign-born workers covered by a union contract increased modestly by between 6,000 and 30,000 workers (again depending on the sample used for 2024).

Union membership density has declined for both US-born and foreign-born workers since 1994 (the first year such metrics were available), with U.S.-born workers consistently showing higher rates of union membership than their foreign-born counterparts (Figure 12). In 1994, 15.7 percent of US-born workers were union members compared to 13.5 percent of foreign-born workers. By 2025, union membership stood at 10.5 percent among US-born workers and 7.9 percent among foreign-born workers. The nativity gap in union membership may partly reflect the lower share of foreign-born workers in the more heavily unionized public sector.

Figure 12

Although union membership rates have declined for both groups, growth in the number of foreign-born workers means their share of union members has increased over time (Figure 13). In 1994, there were roughly 15.3 million US-born union members and 1.4 million who were born abroad. By 2025, US-born membership had declined to around 12.5 million, while foreign-born membership rose to over 2.1 million. As previously noted, this makes foreign-born workers an increasingly vital constituency within the labor movement.

Figure 13

Education

Union membership and coverage rates vary by education level and have shifted unevenly over time. Between 2024 and 2025, union membership and coverage density rose for workers with less than a high school diploma and for those with some college, while rates for high school graduates, workers with a bachelor’s degree, and workers with at least one advanced degree held steady or declined slightly.

However, union membership shares have declined across all education groups since the early 1980s (Figure 14). The decline has been steeper among workers without a bachelor’s degree, though their membership density has remained above those of workers with a bachelor’s degree in most years.

Figure 14

In absolute terms, workers without a bachelor’s degree continue to make up the majority of union members (Figure 15). However, the educational composition of union membership has shifted markedly between 1983, when only 18.6 percent of union members possessed a Bachelor’s degree, and 2025, when 46.5 percent of union members have a Bachelor’s degree. While these trends have mirrored the educational attainment of the overall workforce, those with Bachelor’s degrees remain slightly overrepresented among union members in the US.

Figure 15

Disability

Union membership density has declined for workers with and without disabilities since 2009, though the gap between the two groups has narrowed (Figure 16). Disabled workers were slightly more likely to be union members in the early 2010s, but their rates fell more sharply through the decade. By the mid-to-late 2010s, union membership density among workers with disabilities dipped below that of workers without disabilities. In 2025, union membership stood at 10.7 percent for workers with disabilities and 10.0 percent for workers without disabilities, suggesting a modest rebound for workers with disabilities after prior declines.

Figure 16

The Bureau of Labor Statistics began tracking union membership among workers with disabilities in 2008, making 2009 the first year for which a full 12 months of data were available. While workers with disabilities remain a small share of total union members, their numbers have ticked up slightly in recent years (Figure 17). Membership among disabled workers rose from 463 thousand in 2018 to 736 thousand in 2025, even as membership among nondisabled workers declined slightly to 13.9 million. However, disabled union members still represent only a tiny fraction of the total union workforce.

Figure 17

Notable Trends by Industry and Occupation

Industry and Sector

Table 3 shows union membership and union coverage rates by industry and sector for 2024 and 2025, based on both 11-month and 12-month data samples. Table 4 presents union membership and union coverage counts, in thousands, by industry and sector for 2024 and 2025 using both 11-month and 12-month data samples. Each table includes annual changes in percentage points for each metric.

Table 3

Table 4

Private sector union membership and coverage density remained fairly steady between 2024 and 2025. The number of private sector union members increased by between 124,000 and 154,000, depending on the sample used, while the number of private sector workers covered by a union contract increased by over 200,000 using both samples. 

Motion pictures and sound recording industries saw the largest private sector increase in union membership and coverage density, followed by wholesale trade. The largest private sector membership and coverage density declines took place in broadcasting, followed by transportation and warehousing, and mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction. Transportation and warehousing saw the largest decline in the number of union members and workers covered by a union contract. Durable goods manufacturing also experienced sizable declines in the number of union members and workers covered by a union contract, while nondurable goods manufacturing saw a dip in the number of workers covered by a union contract but a slight uptick in the number of union members. There were also fewer union members and covered workers in arts, entertainment, and recreation and in mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction.

In the public sector, both membership and coverage density appeared to increase in federal and state government, while declining or remaining steady in local government. The number of union members and covered workers followed a similar pattern. However, the picture is more complicated when examining within-year changes rather than annual averages alone. 

In 2025, union membership and coverage density in the federal government were markedly higher at the beginning of the year than at the end (Figure 18). The same is true when measuring the number of federal union members and the number of federal workers covered by a union contract (Figure 19). These patterns contrast with 2023 and 2024, when union membership and coverage tended to remain relatively stable over the course of the year or ticked upward toward year-end rather than declining.

Figure 18

Figure 19

To be clear, data from January 2025 reflect employment and bargaining conditions during the final weeks of the Biden administration, before large-scale personnel reductions were implemented. By the second quarter of 2025, the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was working to cull the federal workforce. The administration also directly targeted federal unions, issuing an executive order that moved to terminate most federal collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) at the end of March 2025 and rapidly implementing additional workplace policy changes, including restrictions on accommodations and flexible work arrangements that were especially consequential for federal workers with disabilities. Unions have continued to pursue litigation over these changes since they were announced.

However, the sharpest 2025 drop in federal union membership and coverage occurred in the fourth quarter of 2025, coinciding with widespread federal layoffs and workforce reductions implemented in October of that year with little regard for legally required procedures and guardrails. Taken together, these within-year dynamics underscore why annual averages alone can obscure important shifts in public-sector unionization, motivating a closer look at year-end union membership and coverage across federal, state, and local government. It remains to be seen what this volatility means in the months to come. Quarterly estimates are based on smaller sample sizes, and the sample for the fourth quarter of 2025 is missing October, so results should therefore be interpreted with caution. Still, the timing and magnitude of the decline are consistent with intensified attacks on federal unions and collective bargaining during 2025, suggesting that these actions may already be affecting membership and coverage levels. At the same time, the fact that annual averages nonetheless exceeded those of the prior year underscores the durability of federal unions and their continued ability to maintain representation for workers despite increasingly aggressive opposition from the Trump administration and Republican lawmakers.

The attacks on federal workers and their unions matter enormously for the labor movement because federal workers are substantially overrepresented in union membership overall. In 2025, federal workers made up 7.6 percent of union members but only 2.5 percent of all employees in the US. This means that shocks to federal unions can have outsized effects on aggregate union density and power, a dynamic that becomes clearer when examining longer-run historical trends in public-sector unionization by level of government. 

Public-sector union membership density has remained substantially higher than in the private sector over the past four decades, but it has declined modestly overall and unevenly across levels of government (Figure 20). In the early 1980s, more than one-third of all public-sector workers were union members. By the mid-2020s, overall public-sector union membership density had fallen by roughly four percentage points, from about 37 percent in 1983 to just under 33 percent in 2025.

Local government workers have consistently had the highest union membership rates, and despite long-term erosion local government continues to be the most unionized segment of the public sector. Since the early 2000s, state government workers have exhibited lower membership density than local government workers but higher density than federal workers. Federal government workers have consistently had the lowest union membership rates within the public sector. 

Figure 20

The number of union members in the public sector has fluctuated over time, reflecting both changes in union density and shifts in public-sector employment levels (Figure 21). Total public-sector union membership rose steadily from the early 1980s through the late 1990s, driven primarily by growth in local government, then plateaued and declined beginning in the early 2000s. Losses accelerated during and after the Great Recession, particularly in local and state government, as layoffs, hiring freezes, and fiscal austerity reduced public-sector employment. Although local government union membership has recovered somewhat in recent years, total public-sector membership in the mid-2020s remains well below its late-1990s peak.

Figure 21

Occupation and Sector

Table 5 shows union membership and coverage rates by occupation and sector for 2024 and 2025, based on both 11-month and 12-month data samples, alongside year-over-year percentage point changes for each metric. Across occupations, the largest year-over-year percentage-point increase in union membership occurred among workers in protective service occupations, followed by those in legal occupations. In the private sector, legal occupations experienced the largest increase, followed by community and social service occupations and then construction and extraction occupations. In the public sector, the biggest gains were observed among workers in farming, fishing, and forestry occupations, followed by production occupations. The largest overall decline in union membership and coverage rates occurred among workers in building and grounds cleaning and maintenance occupations. Despite gains overall, within the private sector, protective service occupations saw the largest decline. In the public sector, the largest decreases were recorded among sales and related occupations, followed by personal care and service occupations.

Table 5

Table 6 shows union membership and coverage counts, in thousands, by occupation and sector for 2024 and 2025, based on both 11-month and 12-month data samples, alongside year-over-year percentage point changes for each metric. Overall, the largest increase in union membership occurred among workers in protective service occupations. In the private sector, construction and extraction occupations experienced the largest increase in membership, while in the public sector, protective service occupations saw the largest gains, followed by office and administrative support occupations. The largest overall declines in union membership were observed among workers in building and grounds cleaning and maintenance occupations or in transportation and material moving occupations, depending on whether the 11-month or 12-month sample is used. Within the private sector, sizable membership declines were concentrated in production, transportation, and material moving occupations, with marked reductions across both production occupations and transportation and material moving occupations. In the public sector, the largest declines in union membership occurred in management occupations or in healthcare practitioners and technical occupations, again depending on the sample used.

Table 6

Geographic Trends

Union membership varies significantly by state and sector. In 2025, overall membership shares range from 24.7 percent in Hawaii to 2.3 percent in South Dakota (Figure 22). In the private sector, they ranged from 13.2 percent to 1.5 percent in the same two states, respectively. In the public sector, union density was highest in New York at 65.2 percent, and lowest in North Carolina at 5.3 percent.

Figure 22

Between 2024 and 2025, Washington saw the largest increase in overall union membership density, which ticked up 2 percentage points to 18 percent (Figure 23). Hawaii actually saw the biggest decline, with membership density falling by 1.9 percentage points but still remaining higher than in any other state. Alaska and Washington both saw membership increases of 1.4 percentage points in the private sector (to 10.4 percent and 11.4 percent, respectively), while Hawaii once again suffered the biggest decline at 2.6 percentage points to 13.2 percent. In the public sector, union membership density grew by 4.6 percentage points to 26 percent in Indiana, and fell by 5.8 percentage points to 10.2 percent in Idaho.

Figure 23

These state-level differences also mirror broader international patterns, with the United States exhibiting lower unionization rates than many of its peers. While Donald Trump has openly expressed interest in making Canada the 51st US state, union membership trends reveal a stark divide in the labor movement’s footprint between the two countries. Canada’s union membership rate has remained consistently higher than that of the US for decades (Figure 24). In 2025, union membership density in Canada was nearly three times higher than in the United States. It also exceeded membership rates in the US states with the highest density, including Hawaii at 24.7 percent and New York at 21.3 percent.

Figure 24

Acknowledgements

The author would like to acknowledge John Schmitt for helpful comments, and Damon L. Daniels for research assistance.

Appendix

Note: Appendix figures use non-zero y-axis baselines to better show differences between the 11-month and 12-month sample estimates.

Appendix Figure 1

Appendix Figure 2

Appendix Figure 3

Appendix Figure 4

Appendix Figure 5

Appendix Figure 6

Appendix Figure 7

Appendix Figure 8