October 30, 2003 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Earnings and union status

In July 2002, average hourly earnings among union workers were $20.65, compared with $16.42 for their nonunion counterparts.

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Unionized workers in blue-collar occupations averaged $18.88 per hour, compared with $12.95 for nonunion blue-collar workers. The highest paid blue-collar workers among the major occupational groups were precision production, craft, and repair workers; in this group, union workers had average hourly earnings of $23.05, compared with $16.33 for nonunion workers.

Among service occupations, union workers had average hourly earnings of $16.22, compared with $8.98 for nonunion workers.

In two white-collar major occupational groups, average hourly earnings were higher for nonunion than for union workers. The first was executive, administrative, and managerial occupations, in which nonunion earnings averaged $31.48 per hour, and union earnings averaged $26.73. The second was sales workers, among whom nonunion workers had average hourly earnings of $14.58, compared with $12.78 for their union counterparts.

These data are from the BLS National Compensation Survey program. Union workers are those whose wages are determined through collective bargaining. Learn more in National Compensation Survey: Occupational Wages in the United States, July 2002, Bulletin 2561 (PDF 719K).