Florida’s largest labor unions lost more than 60,000 members in 2024, representing a 15% decline. Nationwide, tens of thousands of people have left their union or declined to join one.
The Mackinac Center has played a key role in this pro-worker trend through Workers for Opportunity. Five years ago, we launched national efforts to combat Big Labor in an attempt to meet and fight anti-worker efforts everywhere.
For more than 20 years, the Mackinac Center has led the nation in dealing with state labor laws. We’ve provided expert testimony, strategy and now marketing and lobbying efforts on behalf of workers all over the United States. The work is paying off.
In Florida, our worker freedom initiative was a key supporter of and advocate for Senate bill 256. This labor-reform law requires unions to hold recertification elections on a regular basis. As The Wall Street Journal recently noted in an article that mentioned the Mackinac Center’s work, this law helps eliminate “zombie unions” that are “lumbering along without a member mandate.”
The law has been in place for more than a year, with significant results. Last year, more than 63,000 workers were freed from their unions after members didn’t reauthorize them. The state’s affiliate of the National Education Association lost 15.5% of its members. State chapters of AFSCME and SEIU lost more than one third of their statewide membership.
The Mackinac Center’s “My Pay, My Say” initiative also continued to see success. It informs workers of their right, under the 2018 Supreme Court’s Janus decision, not to pay a union. Our marketing campaign has helped hundreds of thousands of workers resign their membership. More than 25% of unionized workers have left their unions since 2018, costing those organizations more than $900 million annually.
The Mackinac Center will not stop fighting for labor policies that advance worker choice and union transparency. Our Workers for Opportunity and My Pay, My Say initiatives are accomplishing those goals.
