Out-Migration not a creditable remedy for unemployment

Pro-Forced Unionism New Hampshire Governor Wrong to Boast About His State’s Job Climate

Pro-Right to Work citizen groups who are now close to securing sufficient legislative support to pass new laws prohibiting the termination of employees for refusal to join or pay dues to an unwanted union in several states, including New Hampshire, argue that one important benefit of such laws is that they facilitate private-sector job growth. From 2000 to 2010, despite the unusually severe recent recession, private-sector employment in the 22 states that already have Right to Work laws on the books actually grew by 0.3% overall, even as it fell by an aggregate 5.5% in the 28 forced-union-dues states.

Union officials and their allies nevertheless insist that forced-unionism states’ employment climates aren’t vastly inferior. To back up that claim, they rely heavily on a single gauge: relative state unemployment rates. For example, in his May 2011 message defending his veto of H.B.474, legislation that would make New Hampshire America’s 23rd Right to Work state, union-label Gov. John Lynch (D) boasted that the Granite State has “one of the lowest unemployment rates . . . in the nation.â€

Unfortunately, Mr. Lynch’s defense of forced-unionism New Hampshire’s economic track record ignores one blindingly obvious and highly relevant fact … (see pdf file attached for full report)