Revive the Middle Class by Bringing Back Unions
A crippling flaw in a New Deal-era law governing unions needs a rewrite.
It’s harder than it should be.
Photographer: Jeff Kowalsky/AFP/Getty ImagesIf the U.S. is going to make a big dent in income inequality and raise living standards for the middle class, it’s going to need a multipronged approach. Higher taxes and more spending on health care will help. Minimum-wage laws can raise pay for workers at the bottom without reducing employment much, but they only benefit a relatively small slice of the workforce. But something else is needed.
One big idea is to bring back unions and collective bargaining. Several teams of economists have examined the historical record and concluded that unions were important in reducing inequality. But although unions are still important in the public sector, in the private sector they’ve been almost wiped out.