How American Tech Workers Feel About Joining A Union
American tech workers, along with lawyers and accountants, have some of the lowest rates of union membership in the country.
But in the last few years of ballooning layoffs, sentiments may be changing.
This graphic, via Visual Capitalist's Marcus Lu, shows the percentage of U.S. tech employees that would join a union if their company had access to one.
Data is sourced from Blind, which conducted an online survey of 1,901 verified tech professionals.
Which Tech Company Employees Are Likely to Join a Union?
Amongst the companies, union support appears to be highest at Intuit (financial software), General Motors, and Oracle (enterprise software).
| Company Name | Likely | Unlikely |
|---|---|---|
| 💼 Intuit | 94% | 6% |
| 🚗 General Motors | 92% | 8% |
| 🖥️ Oracle | 85% | 15% |
| 💻 Atlassian | 85% | 15% |
| 🎨 Adobe | 83% | 17% |
| 📶 Qualcomm | 83% | 17% |
| 82% | 18% | |
| 💽 Dell | 79% | 21% |
| 🏦 Capital One | 78% | 22% |
| 🌐 Cisco | 77% | 23% |
| 📱 ByteDance | 75% | 25% |
| 🔧 Intel Corporation | 74% | 26% |
| 📊 Splunk | 73% | 27% |
| 🟦 Block | 73% | 27% |
| 💳 Visa | 73% | 27% |
| 💸 Stripe | 73% | 27% |
| ☁️ Salesforce | 72% | 28% |
| 🎮 NVIDIA | 71% | 29% |
| 🛒 Amazon | 70% | 30% |
| 🧑💼 Indeed.com | 70% | 30% |
| 🏦 PayPal | 69% | 31% |
| 👗 Nordstrom | 69% | 31% |
| 🏢 Meta | 67% | 33% |
| 🖥️ ServiceNow | 64% | 36% |
| 🚗 Uber | 64% | 36% |
| 🖥️ Microsoft | 63% | 37% |
| 🛍️ Walmart | 60% | 40% |
| 👻 Snap | 58% | 42% |
| 🚙 Rivian Automotive | 58% | 42% |
| 📝 DocuSign | 55% | 45% |
| 🏦 JPMorgan Chase & Co. | 50% | 50% |
| 🍏 Apple | 47% | 53% |
| 🚗 Tesla Motors | 45% | 55% |
| 40% | 60% | |
| 📊 Survey Average | 67% | 33% |
On the other hand, Tesla, DocuSign, and Google employees have the least desire to join a union.
As it happens, over a thousand workers in North America already belong to the Alphabet Workers Union, which represents employees at Google and other subsidiaries like Waymo.
Meanwhile, Tesla has been involved in several controversies regarding unions. For example, in May 2024, a U.S. labor agency accused by Tesla of discouraging workers from creating a union at its Buffalo, NY plant.
However, on average 67% of those polled in the Blind survey said they were likely to join a union and 73% said that unions “mostly helped.”
When Blind asked tech workers why the industry’s union membership rate is so low compared to other jobs, the general sentiment indicated that tech employees are already well compensated for their jobs, without needing collective bargaining.
The tech sector might be poised for an upswing after Federal Reserve’s first big rate cut. Check out How Sectors Perform After Rate Cuts to see where else gains are made.