Right to Work States Furnish ‘Best Opportunities For Job Growth and Economic Prosperity’
For more than 30 years, Pollina Corporate Real Estate, Inc., has furnished businesses large and small with expert and impartial advice that they use to make investment decisions. And for 10 years Pollina has drawn upon its knowledge and experience to rank the 50 states according to their ability to attract and sustain job-creating businesses.
Pollina’s job-climate index rates states according to more than 30 factors over which elected officials have at least some control, but its annual survey nevertheless consistently shows the overwhelmingly majority of the top-ranking states have one specific policy in common. What is the policy that, year after year, nearly all the states that, in Pollina’s words, furnish the “best opportunities for job growth and economic prosperity” have in common? It’s a Right to Work law prohibiting the termination of employees for refusal to join or pay dues to an unwanted union.
Pollina’s latest annual rankings, published just this month, are no exception. In 2013, nine of the top 10 states have Right to Work laws on the books. (See the link below for more information.)
The validity of Pollina’s finding that Right to Work states created far more opportunities for job seekers and employees seeking to advance in their careers is confirmed by a wide array of objective data. Some of the most compelling statistics are demographic. Data from the U.S. Census Bureau, for example, show that the top 12 states for percentage growth in their adult population (aged 25+) with at least a bachelor’s degree education from 2000 to 2011 all have Right to Work laws. Meanwhile, seven of the eight states with the slowest college-educated-adult population growth lacked Right to Work laws at the time. (One of these forced-unionism states, Michigan, adopted a Right to Work law in late 2012 that took effect this spring.)
Why does a single factor explain so much about a state’s business climate? Perhaps because union bosses wielding forced-dues privileges spend a large share of the loot they rake in lobbying for higher taxes on businesses and individuals alike and more red-tape regulation of practically every variety of private enterprise.