INSTITUTE INDEX: Unions as a remedy for growing income inequality

Average CEO compensation in 2013, according to a study released this month: $15.2 million

Percent by which CEO compensation, inflation-adjusted, increased from 1978 to 2013: 937

Percent by which the typical worker's compensation grew over the same period: 10.2

CEO-to-worker compensation ratio in 1965: 20-to-1

In 2013: 295.9-to-1

Rank of the South among U.S. regions with the greatest inequality within its communities: 1



Of the 100 U.S. counties with the greatest income inequality, number in the South: 77

Rank of the South among the nation's least-unionized regions: 1

Percent of all U.S. wage and salary workers who belonged to a union in 1983: 20

In 2012: 11

Percent of the increase in inequality over the past 30 years estimated to be attributable to the decline in unionization: 10 to 20

Percent more union members earn on average than non-union workers in comparable jobs: about 15

Number of states in the old Confederacy with unionization rates above the national average: 0

Year in which the AFL-CIO approved a resolution to develop a Southern organizing strategy: 2013

Of the five states where union membership is growing the fastest, percent in the South: 100

Percent by which union membership grew last year in Tennessee: 25

In Georgia and Alabama: 22.2

In South Carolina: 19

In Virginia: 13.2

Rank of North Carolina among the states with the lowest unionization rates: 1

Percent of North Carolinians who belong to unions: 3

Number of people arrested at this week's Moral Monday protest at the North Carolina legislature focusing on workers' rights, including two national labor leaders: 20

(Click on figure to go to source. Chart from the Economic Policy Institute's website.)