Catherwood LibraryILR School

The number of graduate students around the United States organizing and forming unions is significantly increasing compared to recent years. Graduate worker unionization rates have increased by 133% in the past ten years, as more and more student workers seek higher pay and better employee benefits. Over thirty percent of all graduate students are union members, which is around 150,000 unionized graduate workers. The surge in unionization could be due to the increase in non-tenured positions, postdoctoral positions, and research assistant positions at colleges and universities around the country. The number of unions representing undergraduate students has also increased in past years, but there are fewer undergraduate workers bargaining units compared to graduate student unions.