Dr. Richard Vedder, Director of the Center for College Affordability and Productivity and Professor Emeritus of Economics at Ohio University, was quoted in a Heartland Institute article on “Maine Lawmaker Proposes Workplace Freedom Bill.”
Dr. Richard Vedder
A Maine lawmaker is sponsoring a bill to prohibit requiring union membership as a condition of employment in both private-sector and public-sector workplaces….
Ohio University economics professor Richard Vedder says economic trends are spurring more states to pass laws against involuntary union membership. Vedder is a policy advisor for The Heartland Institute, which publishes Budget & Tax News.
“There was a period from about 1960 to 2010 where there was very little progress in the right-to-work movement, mostly because both sides of the issue were roughly equal in power,” he said. “But as the private sector labor union membership dropped, in many states, to about 10 percent, we have seen an increase in right-to-work laws.
Currently, 25 states have laws protecting voluntary worker association and dues collection. Vedder says the spread of right-to-work protections has been surprisingly quick.
“If you would have told me ten years ago that Wisconsin and Michigan would today be right-to-work states, I would have said you were smoking something,” he said.
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