Labor unionrship as a percentage of the nation’s overall workforce has been steadily declining from its peak of 35 percent in the 1950s. The result is that unions now represent only 6.6 percent of all private-sector jobs, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The BLS data make it clear that the trend isn’t going to reverse anytime soon, because unions lost 400,000 members last year as total employment grew by 2.6 million. The only thing keeping Big Labor from becoming an incidental factor in the American workplace is that government employees are five times more likely to be unionized than those in the private sector.

If corporate executives lost market share as dramatically and steadily as the labor chieftains, they would be shown the door or their doors firms would be shuttered. Failure to develop and sell products and services that people want is a surefire way of going out of business. This is what makes free marketsource of the widest range of goods and services for the most people at the lowest cost.