2022 saw ups for unions, but successes can’t reverse decades-long trend

If you follow labor news, even casually, it would be easy to assume everything is coming up roses for unions. But 2022 may not have been the banner year it appears to have been at a glance.

Looking good

Just going by the headlines, it looks like unions may have the wind at their backs.

The Biden administration, including the National Labor Relation Board’s (NLRB) Democratic majority, has rolled out union-friendly decisions and initiatives. Unions have won elections in places they never have before (think Starbucks, Apple, and Amazon). We’ve seen a spike in worker militancy, including strikes. And polls show that nearly two-thirds of Americans approve of Unions, the highest since 1965.

And the numbers back the news headlines.

Bloomberg Law recently issued its annual NLRB Election Statistics, Year-End 2022 Report, and all 32 pages are chock full of good news for unions. In short, there were more union elections in 2022 than in previous years, and unions were winning most of them.

There were 1,573 elections in 2022 up from 1,021 in 2021. Unions won 1,196 of those elections, an increase from 764 wins in 2021.

Unions won 76% of the 2022 elections, marking the fifth straight year the union win rate was higher than 70%. (For comparison, unions have won more than 60% of all representation elections in each of the past 18 years.)

Surprises behind the numbers