Just before Labor Day this year, Gallup released a poll showing there’s been a steady increase in how much influence Americans want labor unions to have. Nearly half of Americans, Gallup reports, “want labor unions in the U.S. to have more influence than they do today.” Gallup says that figure is a record high for the past quarter century, and nearly twice the percentage who want to see unions have less influence.
It might be surprising news, given the hurricane-force anti-union headwinds that have emanated from this administration. Much of that has been directed toward public sector workers. The so-called “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE) went after government agencies for their supposed inefficiency and slashed budgets–and staff. In fact, DOGE oversaw the biggest cut in the federal workforce, but still didn’t reduce spending.
Given that spending didn’t go down as promised, one thing that will likely be helpful efficiency-wise is the official dismantling DOGE last summer. Instead of efficiency, the administration decimated necessary things like cancer research, while the same government let no-bid contracts metastasize and the concurrent potential for corruption spread unchecked.
The positive news for labor unions contained in the Gallup survey might reflect a tipping point of the effectiveness of the anti-union message being pushed by the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025–which called for, among other things, having Congress determine whether public-sector unions are “appropriate.” It’s possible that fatigue has set in among the public, who saw nurses and other medical professionals, city workers–including health departments, state and national park staffers, and other public sector workers reporting for duty during the pandemic, and teachers and school personnel showing up in the pandemic’s wake, to try to heal, teach, fix, and reconnect the nation back to something as close to equilibrium as possible in our fractured society.
In emerging leaders like New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, the public saw a politician who both sings the praises of public employees while also requiring high-quality public services from city workers. “Excellence will become the expectation across government,” he said in his inaugural address, “not the exception.” On social media, Mamdani posted, “There is no NYC without unions,” and this summer he issued an executive order designed to protect city workers from the dangers of working in the extreme heat. But he also directed city agencies to find ways to trim their budgets by 2.5 percent. He created the Mayor’s Office of Worker Power, but he also created the Commission on Government Efficiency, proving that leadership and inspiration can accomplish what a tech bro with no government experience was unable to.
It might be that the anti-union forces who convinced some Americans that labor unions were bad for America overplayed their hands as the more plausible villains–the billionaires profiting nicely off of high inflation,and tax cuts–are unmasked. If the recent Gallup results are any indication, Labor Day this year might mark the end of more than just summer.
Jeff Hagan
Communications Director
Photo: Ed Reed/Mayoral Photography Office