by David B Hitchcock

Created on: August 31, 2009   Last Updated: September 02, 2009

Is it worth it to join the union? 6 points to consider when joining a union.

People hear lots of things about unions, some good and some not so good. It's hard to know what to believe. Deciding if a union is right for you is an important decision that needs hard facts for you to decide best for you. Let's look at some factors you should consider about unions.

THE ROLE OF A UNION

You can guess that unions look out for the interests of the employees. The first unions were formed many years ago, but gained a lot of bargaining power in the United States during the 1950's. Without unions there wouldn't be employee benefits, pensions, a 40-hour work week, proper overtime pay, and other perks that make life for an employee that much better. The union provides workers with a unite and strong voice when dealing with their employer. This tends to carry a lot of weight with the employer because if their employees all leave, business will suffer, and possibly suffer a lot.

When you are considering joining a union, you need to ask what can a union do or get for me that I otherwise wouldn't be able to do or have?

PENSION

Many jobs today, such as IT jobs, have no pensions. If those jobs had unions, chances are they would have pensions. But you need to look at the pension plan and the other people in the union before you sign on for that. If you are a young person in your 30s, and the main portion of the people in the union are age 50 and up, will you see anything from the pension? That is a good question because when you are 50 and still part of that union, your dues will be going to pay the pension of all those people who retired before you. If those people don't die, the number of people the pension fund is supporting keeps going up, while the people paying into the pension fund stays the same. If this continues, the pension fund will disappear. Hopefully this won't happen before your turn comes, but you need to ask questions to decide if this is likely to happen. If is it, you are better off investing your own money in your own plan.

HEALTH BENEFITS

While individuals can sign up for health plans by themselves, the rates they pay are very high compared to what large groups such as unions pay. The larger the group, the easier it is to get these good rates. From the insurance company point of view, they are guaranteed the money from this large group of people each month. Often, union members have families, which makes health benefits worth that much more to them than to single

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