1993 Union Members — 1994-02-09

Union membership rose to 16.6 million in 1993 from 16.4 million a year earlier, following a 14-year downward slide, the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. The overall increase in membership largely reflected an increase in the number of government workers who were union members. The proportion of all employees who were union members remained at 15.8 percent in 1993, as employment increased at about the same rate as membership over the year. Slightly less than three-fifths of union members (9.6 million) were in private industry, where they made up 11.2 percent of employment. The remaining union members (7.0 million) were in government (federal, state, and local), where they constituted 37.7 percent of employment. (See tables 1 and 2.) In private industry, manufacturing had the largest number of union members (3.6 million), followed by transportation and public utilities (1.9 million), services (1.5 million), wholesale and retail trade (1.4 million), and construction (900,000).