From a high of around 18 million in 1975, private sector union membership has declined to around 8 million today. Presuming the UAW will effectively be wiped out by the latest dictums on Detroit, that will knock out another 465,000 or 6% of the total. (Sure, Ford's UAW membership could still exist, but that will be a rather toothless tiger).

It's been a steady fall for the UAW since its peak in 1979 at 1.5 million. Reagan ushered in the anti-union spirit, especially with his mass firing of flight controllers in 1983. But the steady decline of manufacturing and the non-unionization of computer jobs has turned the US into a largely non-unionized workspace today. And despite the IT field being largely non-unionized, that didn't save it from being scapegoated as "too high salaries" in the early 2000's, with more calls for more H-1B's from India. Demonization of unions has become standard fare for describing our ills even as unions have largely turned ineffectual.

And conservatives hate unions as much as they hate the National Endowment of the Arts. The destruction of the UAW is not the last stone. Unions in education are consistently blamed for our educational ills (with school vouchers being one way to suck air from that system, No Child Left Behind being a way to kill off local and thus union control). Health Care unions will certainly be a target of any attempts at national health care, under the sad refrain that insurance companies just can't make a profit as long as health care workers insist on making decent salaries. Pilots have sucked up cuts in recent years to keep airlines afloat. It's just not an easy time to negotiate contracts that benefit workers, and with the trillions that have spearheaded efforts to ensure "stockholder value" (read: "short-term profits"), you can bet that workers don't have money to fight back both against internal and external efforts.

As for public unions, now up to 8 million, just remember: 1983. And 2001. We won't let you shut down government. That would abet the terrorists. It's a time of war, you know.

Fortunately the trend is now for workers to have 401(K) and 403(B) retirement accounts to move around. Unfortunately, those accounts are getting battered between stock and real-estate crashes as well as normal pension raiding. Fortunately workers now have COBRA to ensure they can pay $1500/month to keep medical benefits in times of inevitable layoffs, which if they don't quite manage lead them to have half their care labeled "pre-existing conditions" if they happen to find replacement work. Fortunately we have a court system that's sympathetic to workers' complaints in wrongful firings and treatment. Fortunately unions are no longer needed because the needs of the average citizen are universally recognized and protected by both government and corporations themselves. 

Laa-la-la-laa-laa, laa-la-la-laa, let's all sing to the death of a clown...

[PS - on my previous posts I made the mistake of saying auto companies got roughly 0.2% or 0.5% of the bailout money, depending on what figures you use. Sorry, they got repayable loans instead, along with severe conditions on reorganization, layoffs and forced wage and benefits cuts to union. It was AIG that got the no-conditions free money with big bonuses to upper staff. Mea culpa.]

[PPS - for the inevitable testimonials, the best cars I owned were an Olds 98, a Ford Maverick (bought for $100 and driven across the country several times), a Ford Econoline van for $400 that spewed smoke and had loose steering but was invaluable for a poor musician, and a Renault van that drove nicely. Had a Subaru that absolutely sucked, a Dodge van that was pretty awful, a Toyota that isn't quite all there. I don't go to consumer reports for any of this stuff, just plop my nickel down, takes my chances.]