[nullymcnull]

I am curious as to where you are getting the idea that "unionization in Canada is still as strong as the strongest years in the US". That's pretty much the opposite of my personal experience and observations, and it's not the consensus I've been hearing (which is that organized labour has been at an absolute nadir in the past few decades, as much in decline as in the US). Unions have shrunk, membership are down, political clout is down, and a newly unionized company is a rare bird indeed. Perhaps the high rate of unionization in the public sector skews the stats here, because in the private sector, things are pretty much a mirror of the US situation.

From what I can tell, all of the same factors that are driving down wages in the US - increased consolidation, far more 'temp' positions brokered by temp agencies - apply to Canada as well, and have had the same effect.

[randomdata]

> I am curious as to where you are getting the idea that "unionization in Canada is still as strong as the strongest years in the US"

Based on the share of the workforce that is represented by unions. Canada is currently at ~30%, the US peaked at ~30% and is at less than 10% today.

> Unions have shrunk, membership are down, political clout is down, and a newly unionized company is a rare bird indeed.

Unionization is indeed down, but what I said is that it is still about as strong as the strongest years in the US. Canada had even stronger unions through the 80s, when it peaked at just shy of 40%. Interestingly, much of the same wage issues we face today were still present at that time. Wages have been stagnant since at least the 70s, according to the Canadian government (and American data echos this).

[eesmith]

When you say "represented by unions", do you mean the unionization rate or the coverage rate?

In terms of unionization rate, in 2016 Canada was at 28.4% [1]. By comparison, the US peak was 34.8% in 1954 [2] . (It is now 10.7% [3], which is slightly higher than 10%, not less than.)

While the "~" can justify a rounding to the nearest 10% instead of 5%, that ended up hiding a difference of 6.5%, or 1/5th of the total unionized population. From what I can tell, the current rate of around 28% corresponds to the US unionization rate in about 1970 [3], and not its peak in 1954.

The US peak of 34.8% is closer to the Canadian peak of 37.9% in 1984 than it is to 30%, and corresponds to the Canadian unionization rate in 1991 [1].

The coverage rate for both countries is of course higher. For 2017 in Canada it was 30.4% [5] and in US is was 11.9% [3].

[1] "http://www.statcan.gc.ca/daily-quotidien/170908/cg-a003-eng....

[2] "At their peak in 1954, 34.8% of all U.S. wage and salary workers belonged to unions" - http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/02/20/for-american... .

[3] http://unionstats.gsu.edu/All-Wage-and-Salary-Workers.htm . The BLS gives the same unionization numbers for 2017 (but no coverage numbers) at https://www.bls.gov/news.release/union2.nr0.htm .

[4] http://www.statcan.gc.ca/daily-quotidien/170908/cg-a003-eng....

[5] https://www.statista.com/statistics/442980/canada-union-cove...