Union membership statistics at a glance
Union membership statistics in 2025 show a labor market with a clear split between public and private employment, and a wage gap that is easy to quantify. The latest figures show 10.0 percent of U.S. wage and salary workers belonged to unions, while 11.2 percent were represented by a union (BLS Union Members 2025).
Table of contents
- Fast facts
- 2025 headline numbers
- Membership by sector
- Occupations with the strongest union presence
- Demographic patterns
- State-level concentration
- Wages and representation
- What the numbers suggest
Fast facts
- 14.7 million wage and salary workers belonged to unions in 2025 (BLS Union Members 2025).
- 16.5 million wage and salary workers were represented by a union in 2025 (BLS Union Members 2025).
- Public-sector workers had a 32.9 percent union membership rate in 2025, compared with 5.9 percent in the private sector (BLS Union Members 2025).
- Local government workers posted the strongest sector figure in the dataset at 37.8 percent (BLS Union Members 2025).
- Union members earned a median weekly wage of $1,404, versus $1,174 for nonunion workers (BLS Union Members 2025).
- California and New York remained the largest state-level union centers in the 2024 and 2025 figures (BLS Union Members 2024; BLS Union Members 2025).
At a glance
The pattern is simple: union membership statistics are strongest where the public sector is large, certain occupations are concentrated, and wage differences are more visible. The 2025 data also shows that representation is broader than direct membership, which matters when reading the headline rate of 10.0 percent (BLS Union Members 2025).
2025 headline numbers
The 2025 national figures establish the baseline for the rest of the dataset. 10.0 percent of wage and salary workers were union members, and 11.2 percent were represented by a union (BLS Union Members 2025). That spread between membership and representation is important because it shows that some workers are covered or represented even if they are not formal members.
A few other 2025 totals frame the scale of unionized work in the U.S. labor force:
- 14.7 million wage and salary workers belonged to unions.
- 16.5 million wage and salary workers were represented by a union.
- Union members in the public sector numbered 7.3 million.
- Union members in the private sector numbered 7.4 million.
Taken together, those totals show that union membership is not confined to one single branch of employment. The membership count is nearly balanced between public and private sectors, even though the rate of unionization differs sharply across those sectors (BLS Union Members 2025).
Membership by sector
Sector comparisons are where union membership statistics become especially readable. The gap between public and private work is the biggest structural divide in the 2025 dataset.
| Sector | 2025 union membership rate | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Public sector | 32.9% | Highest broad sector rate in the dataset (BLS Union Members 2025) |
| Private sector | 5.9% | Much lower than public employment (BLS Union Members 2025) |
| Local government | 37.8% | Highest specific sector figure listed (BLS Union Members 2025) |
| Utilities | 17.8% | Strong private-industry presence (BLS Union Members 2025) |
| Transportation and warehousing | 13.6% | Above the overall national rate (BLS Union Members 2025) |
| Educational services | 13.4% | Also above the national rate (BLS Union Members 2025) |
| Agriculture and related industries | 1.6% | Very low union presence (BLS Union Members 2025) |
| Food services and drinking places | 1.8% | Very low union presence (BLS Union Members 2025) |
The public-sector figure of 32.9 percent is more than five times the private-sector figure of 5.9 percent. That is not a minor gap; it defines the structure of unionization in the U.S. labor market (BLS Union Members 2025).
Why the sector gap matters
A sector comparison does more than rank categories. It shows where union membership is concentrated, where it is thin, and where a worker is statistically more likely to encounter union representation.
- Public employment remains the clearest union stronghold.
- Private-sector unionization exists, but it is far less common overall.
- Some industries such as utilities and transportation sit meaningfully above the national average, suggesting that union membership is shaped by job type as well as sector (BLS Union Members 2025).
Occupations with the strongest union presence
Occupation data adds a more detailed layer to the union membership statistics. It shows that unionization is not only a sector story; it is also an occupational story.
| Occupation group | 2025 union membership rate | Interpretation |
|---|---|---|
| Education, training, and library occupations | 32.5% | One of the strongest occupational rates (BLS Union Members 2025) |
| Protective service occupations | 31.3% | Another high-rate occupational group (BLS Union Members 2025) |
| Sales and related occupations | 2.5% | Low union density (BLS Union Members 2025) |
| Farming, fishing, and forestry occupations | 2.4% | Low union density (BLS Union Members 2025) |
The strongest occupational figures cluster in jobs that often have formalized schedules, standardized responsibilities, or public-facing institutional structures. Education, training, and library occupations reached 32.5 percent, while protective service occupations reached 31.3 percent (BLS Union Members 2025).
At the other end of the scale, sales and related occupations sat at 2.5 percent, and farming, fishing, and forestry occupations sat at 2.4 percent (BLS Union Members 2025). That contrast helps show how union membership statistics vary not just by employer, but by the nature of the work itself.
Big number
32.5 percent in education, training, and library occupations is close to the public-sector rate and far above the national average. That kind of alignment suggests that the labor structure of the occupation is doing real work in shaping union presence (BLS Union Members 2025).
Demographic patterns
Union membership statistics also vary across demographic groups, though the differences are narrower than the public-versus-private split.
Gender
Women had a 9.6 percent union membership rate in 2025, while men had a 10.4 percent rate (BLS Union Members 2025). The difference is modest, but it is still visible in the national totals.
The raw membership counts help give that split more context:
- Women union members numbered 6.8 million.
- Men union members numbered 7.9 million.
Those totals show that men represented a somewhat larger share of union members in the 2025 data, while both groups remained close to the national average overall (BLS Union Members 2025).
Race and ethnicity
The 2025 rates show meaningful variation across race and ethnicity:
- Black workers: 11.4 percent
- White workers: 9.9 percent
- Asian workers: 8.7 percent
- Hispanic workers: 8.9 percent
Black workers posted the highest rate in this set, at 11.4 percent, which is above the national average of 10.0 percent (BLS Union Members 2025). White workers were just below the national rate at 9.9 percent, while Asian and Hispanic workers were both under 9 percent (BLS Union Members 2025).
Age
Age is another place where the data shows a clear pattern. Workers ages 45 to 54 had the highest age-group union membership rate at 12.6 percent (BLS Union Members 2025). Workers ages 16 to 24 had a much lower rate of 4.7 percent (BLS Union Members 2025).
That spread matters because it suggests that union membership tends to rise with career stability and tenure, at least within the age breakdown included here.
Work status
The 2025 figures also separate full-time and part-time workers:
- Full-time workers: 10.9 percent
- Part-time workers: 5.7 percent
Full-time workers were almost twice as likely to be union members as part-time workers in the supplied data (BLS Union Members 2025). That is another sign that stronger attachment to the labor force is associated with greater union presence.
State-level concentration
The state data adds geographic texture to the national picture. Some states sit well above the average, while others are far below it.
| State | 2024 union membership rate | 2024 union members | 2025 union membership rate | 2025 union members |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| California | not stated | 2.4 million | 14.9% | 2.489 million |
| New York | 20.6% | 1.7 million | not stated | not stated |
| Hawaii | 26.5% | not stated | not stated | not stated |
| North Carolina | 2.4% | not stated | not stated | not stated |
| South Dakota | 2.7% | not stated | not stated | not stated |
| South Carolina | 2.8% | not stated | not stated | not stated |
Two other 2024 state-level totals make the concentration point even clearer:
- 30 states had union membership rates below the U.S. average of 9.9 percent (BLS Union Members 2024).
- 20 states plus the District of Columbia had rates above the U.S. average (BLS Union Members 2024).
That means a majority of states sat below the national average in 2024, even though the national average itself was just under 10 percent. In other words, the country-wide number can hide the fact that union membership is geographically uneven (BLS Union Members 2024).
Where the concentration is strongest
California and New York stand out in the supplied figures for both rate and raw membership. In 2024, California had 2.4 million union members and New York had 1.7 million (BLS Union Members 2024). The same dataset also says about 29 percent of U.S. union members lived in California and New York combined, even though the two states accounted for 17 percent of U.S. wage and salary employment (BLS Union Members 2024).
That is a powerful concentration signal:
- Union members are not spread evenly across the country.
- Large employment states do not automatically translate into equal union membership share.
- California and New York together over-index on union presence compared with their share of employment (BLS Union Members 2024).
Wages and representation
The wage figures are among the most quotable union membership statistics in the dataset. In 2025, union members earned a median weekly wage of $1,404, while nonunion workers earned $1,174 (BLS Union Members 2025).
That is a difference of $230 per week in the supplied data. On a weekly basis, the gap is large enough to be immediately noticeable, and it provides a clean comparison point for readers who want a simple summary of how union membership lines up with pay (BLS Union Members 2025).
Representation versus membership
Another useful distinction is between membership and representation. The 2025 data shows:
- 14.7 million workers belonged to unions.
- 16.5 million workers were represented by a union.
- The membership rate was 10.0 percent.
- The representation rate was 11.2 percent (BLS Union Members 2025).
This means the represented share is larger than the direct membership share. For readers comparing union membership statistics, that difference is not cosmetic; it changes how the labor force is counted and how coverage is interpreted.
Pull-quote style stat highlight
Union members earned a median weekly wage of $1,404 in 2025, compared with $1,174 for nonunion workers (BLS Union Members 2025).
What the numbers suggest
The supplied union membership statistics point to a few clear themes without needing any outside context.
- Union membership is structurally stronger in the public sector than in the private sector.
- Some occupations, especially education and protective service jobs, remain far more unionized than the national average.
- Demographic differences exist, but they are smaller than the institutional differences by sector and occupation.
- Geographic concentration matters a great deal, with California and New York carrying a disproportionate share of union members relative to employment.
- Representation is broader than membership, so the headline rate alone understates the scope of union coverage in the labor market (BLS Union Members 2025; BLS Union Members 2024).
The most useful way to read these union membership statistics is not as one single national number, but as a set of nested patterns. The national average tells you where the labor market stands overall. The sector, occupation, demographic, and state figures explain why that average looks the way it does.
Key takeaways
- The 2025 union membership rate was 10.0 percent.
- The public-sector rate was 32.9 percent, versus 5.9 percent in the private sector.
- Union members earned $1,404 median weekly wages, above the $1,174 median for nonunion workers.
- California and New York were the largest concentration points in the state data.
- The biggest differences in union membership statistics come from sector and occupation, not from the national headline alone.