IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/osf/socarx/uaj3n_v1.html

Unionization in Higher Education: An Industry-Level View

Author

Listed:
  • van der Naald, Joseph

    (School of Labor and Urban Studies, CUNY)

Abstract

This research note presents estimates of union membership and collective bargaining coverage in the higher education industry using data from the Current Population Survey. The paper analyzes the extent of union membership and collective bargaining coverage from 1983-2025, both in the industry and among faculty specifically, and estimates of the variation in union membership by employment sector, race and gender for 2024. Using a 10-year span of data, the paper also estimates union wage premiums in the industry and among faculty. This note finds union membership and bargaining coverage has remained stable over the past four decades, but documents notable gendered and ethnoracial disparities in both measures in 2024. Faculty and industry collective bargaining results in earnings premiums ranging between 4% and 5%. The findings present quantitative estimates of unionism and its material effects for higher education workers that complement recent research published by the National Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education and the Professions.

Suggested Citation

  • van der Naald, Joseph, 2026. "Unionization in Higher Education: An Industry-Level View," SocArXiv uaj3n_v1, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:uaj3n_v1
    DOI: 10.31235/osf.io/uaj3n_v1
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://osf.io/download/6a8611bbc88b343f1d6c58ed/
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.31235/osf.io/uaj3n_v1?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:uaj3n_v1. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: OSF (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://socarxiv.org .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.