Influence
There are currently 55 trade unions with membership of Congress, representing about 600,000 members in the Republic of Ireland. Trade union members represent 35.1% of the Republic's workforce. This is a significant decline since the 55.3% recorded in 1980 and the 38.5% reported in 2003. In the Republic, over 60% of union members are in the public sector. Currently, over 1.4m of the Republic's taxpaying workforce are not members of unions.
These figures are questionable as the total workforce in Ireland is between 1.6 and 1.7 million (taking current unemployment levels into account). That workforce also includes some 400,000 self-employed and managers who have no entitlement to join a trade union. So, if Congress has in excess of 600,000 members in the Republic, how can there possibly be 1.4m who are not members. In addition, the majority of trade union members in Ireland are private sector workers (approx 45/55 split), while union density levels ranging from 34-38% compare very favourably with continental Europe, where they average 21-22%. In countries such as France and Spain they fall far lower.
Read more about this topic: Irish Congress Of Trade Unions
Famous quotes containing the word influence:
“My administration is pledged to follow the policies of Mr. Roosevelt in this regard, and while that pledge does not involve me in any obligation to carry them out unless I have Congressional authority to do so, it does require that I take every step and exert every legislative influence upon Congress to enact the legislation which shall best subserve the purposes indicated.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)
“Who shall set a limit to the influence of a human being? There are men, who, by their sympathetic attractions, carry nations with them, and lead the activity of the human race. And if there be such a tie, that, wherever the mind of man goes, nature will accompany him, perhaps there are men whose magnetisms are of that force to draw material and elemental powers, and, where they appear, immense instrumentalities organize around them.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Exhaust them, wrestle with them, let them not go until their blessing be won, and, after a short season, the dismay will be overpast, the excess of influence withdrawn, and they will be no longer an alarming meteor, but one more brighter star shining serenely in your heaven, and blending its light with all your day.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)