I ask based on today’s News & Observer article:

Last week, labor strife in Raleigh prompted Mayor Charles Meeker to meet exclusively with leaders of UE 150. Some lawmakers think Raleigh’s negotiations could lead to change across North Carolina — one of the country’s least unionized states — especially by chipping away at its ban on collective bargaining.

“There’s increased momentum” to loosen restrictions on organized labor, said Rep. Deborah Ross, a Raleigh Democrat. “I think it’s in a better position now than it’s ever been. But the passion about this is really Triangle-based right now.”

The article is based in part on the “disadvantage” unions are at in a right-to-work state such as N.C., where compulsory union membership is illegal. It would have been nice for the article to discuss the advantages to the workers in having a choice to join or not. One advantage is discussed, but only under the lens of how it is also a disadvantage to unions:

Some are reluctant to join and pay $13 monthly dues knowing that the law forbids cities from forming contracts with unions.

I’ll bet some are reluctant to part with $13/month for many other reasons, too. It would have been nice for the reporter not to infer workers’ reasons for not unionizing. UE 150 apparently has exhibited other notorious features of unions that workers in a right-to-work state fortunately don’t have to put up with:

When UE 150 met with Meeker last week, leaders asked a nonunion sanitation worker to leave. On his way out, the worker said that he thinks the union represents slightly more than half of the workers in the Department of Solid Waste Services. …

Charles Moody, a nonunion recycling employee who has been active in the workers’ drive for shorter hours and overtime pay, said a union representative called him at 10 p.m. asking for his bank information so his check could be garnished for dues.

He said he resents the exclusion of nonunion workers, adding that he and other such sanitation workers will meet with Meeker this week.

“We’re supposed to be on one accord,” he said. “They’re doing what’s already been done: separating us.”