LaborLab, a workers' rights watchdog, has launched a free online union-buster search tool and a cost calculator to help workers understand and counter the $1.7 billion union-avoidance industry in the United States. The tools, which debuted on September 8, are designed to give workers a clearer picture of the specialists and resources their employers deploy to discourage organizing and bargaining for better pay and working conditions.
Many U.S. employers hire anti-union consultants and law firms to dissuade workers from organizing. These specialists, often paid more than $400 per hour, coach supervisors on anti-union messaging, track union support, prepare campaign literature and speeches aimed at sowing fear and doubt, and sometimes directly persuade workers while presenting themselves as "educators." By law, many of these relationships must be disclosed, but the information is scattered across federal databases that are notoriously difficult to search.
LaborLab's search tool consolidates data from National Labor Relations Board and Department of Labor filings, covering more than 800 consultants, 8,000 law firms, and 21,000 attorneys. Users can see which employers union-busters represent, the rates they charge, their campaign history, the unions they target most often, and, where available, their win-loss records, with direct links to NLRB cases and DOL disclosures. The tool is available at https://laborlab.org/union-buster-search-tool/.
The cost calculator complements the search tool by allowing workers to estimate the full cost of their employer's anti-union campaign. It calculates up to seven costs employers bear by fighting a union rather than voluntarily recognizing one upon proof of majority support. These include direct expenditures on attorneys and consultants and hidden internal costs, such as paid employee time spent in anti-union one-on-ones and staff meetings. The calculator also estimates a wage increase that the employer could have provided with those resources instead. LaborLab's estimates have been presented to the Minnesota Senate and cited in coverage of organizing campaigns by nurses, therapists, and mechanics. An in-depth explanation of the calculator's cost categories and default assumptions is available at https://laborlab.org/union-busting-cost-calculator/.
"These tools advance LaborLab's vision of providing resources that can help directly empower workers to organize their workplaces," said Bob Funk, executive director of LaborLab. "We envision worker-organizers, union staffers and labor attorneys using the search tool to identify unions that have previously dealt with a particular anti-union attorney or consultant, learn from their experience and share that information with other workers."
In 1959, Congress required union-avoidance consultants and employers to disclose many of their activities and related payments, concluding that "this type of activity by or on behalf of employers is reprehensible" and "should be exposed to public view." However, reporting loopholes, weak enforcement, and fragmented government databases have long made that information difficult for workers to find. As the Department of Labor and Congress fail to implement long-needed reforms, LaborLab's new tools are an important step toward closing the information gap for workers—a gap detailed in a new LaborLab report available at https://laborlab.org/report/.
Founded in 2021, LaborLab is the nation's leading watchdog tracking the union-avoidance industry. It empowers tens of thousands of workers annually through research and educational resources and holds corporations accountable for violating workers' rights. LaborLab is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that tracks, exposes, and counters the employer opposition industry through LMRDA compliance monitoring, investigative research, and real-time campaign intelligence, helping workers organize and win strong first contracts.
