Union Decline and Rising Inequality

Body

PPC Social Science researcher Colin Gordon wrote a guest post on the blog of the Economic Policy Institute. The post titled, "Union Decline and Rising Inequality in Two Charts," features two animated graphs that show the relationship between union decline and inequality. The first graph charts the trajectory of union density against the share of national income going to the richest 10% of Americans. Based on the data, Gordon argues that "labor unions both sustained prosperity, and ensured that it was shared." The second graph plots income inequality against union coverage by state for 1979, 1989, 1999, and 2009.