Unions Support Families by Providing Better Benefits

Working people in unionized workplaces are more likely to have benefits that strengthen families and improve job security. Here are just a few ways unions provide better benefits for families.

• Union workers are more likely to be covered by employer-provided health insurance

  • 94% of workers covered by a union contract have access to employer-sponsored health benefits, compared with just 67% of nonunion workers.

• Union employers contribute more to their health care benefits.

  • Union employers pay more per hour worked toward their employees’ health coverage which provides better benefits for a greater share of workers than comparable nonunion employers.

• Union workers have greater access to paid sick days.

  • 87% of workers covered by a union contract have access to paid sick days, compared with 69% of nonunion workers.

• Union workers are more likely to have paid vacation and holidays.

  • 80% of union workers get paid holidays while 75% of nonunion workers do.

• Unions provide due process.

  • Union contracts have provisions that allow workers to be fired, but only when the employer shows just cause for dismissing the worker.

• Union workers get more advance notice of their work schedules.

  • More than one in three workers who belong to a union get at least a week’s advance notice of their work schedules, whereas less than one in four nonunion workers do. This number excludes workers whose schedules never change.

Unions have participated in movements to enact paid sick days laws. For example, voter outreach by our own United Food and Commercial Workers from Local 555 helped win passage of a paid sick days law in Oregon, and the SEIU was a key player in enacting the nation’s strongest paid sick days policy, in Massachusetts. Read how the UFCW helped Oregon become the 4th state to mandate paid sick leave here.

Source: Economic Policy Institute, Josh Bivens, Lora Engdahl, Elise Gould, Teresa Kroeger, Celine McNicholas, Lawrence Mishel, Zane Mokhiber, Heidi Shierholz, Marni von Wilpert, Valerie Wilson, and Ben Zipperer. 2017, August 24. How today’s unions help working people. Retrieved from

https://www.epi.org/publication/how-todays-unions-help-working-people-giving-workers-the-power-to-improve-their-jobs-and-unrig-the-economy/#epi-toc-12