The 2016 Indicator of Labor Liberty, a Center for Worker Freedom project, was featured in Kevin Mooney’s Daily Signal piece, Where Does Your State Stand on the Right to Work?  This Project Maps Out the Answers.  The Daily Signal is The Heritage Foundation’s multimedia news organization. 

The article touches on Friedrichs v. CTA, a public employee free speech case currently before the U.S. Supreme Court.  CWF’s Indicator presents two maps, one of which demonstrates how the Friedrichs ruling could change the status of 21 states.  According to CWF’s research fellow and project leader, Paige Halper, the Indicator’s purpose is to “provide the most current and comprehensive classification of worker freedom.”

The Indicator highlights the messy and confusing nature of labor relations laws across the U.S.  The maps are continually changing and being updated as new laws and decisions are made. 

Mooney notes that, in regards to Justice Antonin Scalia’s recent passing, Friedrichs’ outcome has become increasingly more complicated.  He cites the importance of the project:

One development this year is incorporated into the latest version of the ‘labor liberty’ maps.  On Feb. 12, West Virginia became the 26^th right-to-work state, as well as the 25^th ‘public and private voluntary’ state, after the legislature overrode a veto by Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin, a Democrat, on right-to-work legislation.  Under right-to-work laws, private sector workers are not required to pay union fees or join a union as a condition of their employment… Assuming the Supreme Court acts decisively in favor of Friedrichs at some point, the Center’s Patterson said, a ruling that overturns forced unionization in the public sector will provide further impetus to right-to-work reforms in the private sector.

Read Kevin’s whole piece here. 

Find CWF’s original project here.