Labor Unions and Party Affiliation
Alternative Title
Abstract
How does labor union membership affect voting behavior for political parties? The goal for my research is to further the understanding of how labor unions act in the political sphere. While labor union membership has declined greatly over the past half century, in recent years strike activity, union approval, and union election filings have increased. To gauge how these events will play out politically, it is important to gauge how unions may impact their members voting behaviors. I will use a regression analysis to compare labor union membership and voting behavior as assessed in the cooperative election study. Potential confounding variables will be controlled to ensure accurate results. he expected finding is that labor union membership will be a moderator that increases the likelihood of a member voting for the democratic party when controlling for other variables including race, religion, and sector of employment. This is likely due to the strong relationship to the democratic party that many labor unions have, however, it may also have to do with the strong social trust in institutions, like labor unions, that many voters for the democratic party also have.