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Hawaii’s union membership of 23.7% was the highest in the nation in 2020 and more than double the national average.
There were 120,000 union members among wage and salary workers in the state, according to new data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
That was up from 23.5% in 2019. In addition to the 120,000 members, another 10,000 wage and salary workers in the state were represented by a union on their main job or covered by an employee association or contract while not union members themselves.
New York was the only other state to exceed 20% union membership, at 22%.
Nationwide, 14.3 million wage and salary workers were union members in 2020; and 1.7 million wage and salary workers were not affiliated with a union, but had jobs covered by a union contract. The national average last year was 10.8%.
Hawaii’s union membership was at its peak in 1989 when it averaged 29.9% and at its low point in 2016 at 19.9%.
In 2020, 30 states and the District of Columbia had union membership rates below the U.S. average, while 20 states had rates above it. Nine states had union membership rates below 5% last year. South Carolina had the lowest rate at 2.9%.
Since 1989, when comparable state data became available, union membership rates in Hawaii have been above the U.S. average.
Data on union members for 2020 reflects the impact on the labor market of the COVID-19 pandemic and efforts to contain it.
