Contact:
Samuel Friedman
Communications Director
(302) 273-0080
sam@caesarrodney.org
 
Poll Headlines National Employee Freedom Week’s Grassroots Campaign
to Educate Union Employees about their Rights
 
Newark- Eighty-two percent of Delawareans support allowing union employees to leave their union without force or penalty, a concept generally referred to as right-to-work. That's the finding of a new poll, released today by the Caesar Rodney Institute as part of National Employee Freedom Week (NEFW).
 
A poll conducted by Google Consumer Surveys of 500 Delaware adults found that 82 percent of Delawareans said yes to the question, "Should employees have the right to decide, without force or penalty, whether to join or leave a labor union?" This number include 84 percent of respondents living in urban areas and 80 percent of respondents living in suburban areas. 
 
A 2013 Google Consumer Surveys poll found 30 percent of Delaware's union households would leave their union if they could do so without penalty. Delaware is not a right-to-work state but union members who wish to stop paying union dues may opt out either be requesting a rebate for the portion of their dues which goes towards political spending or if they become a religious or conscientious objector and request their dues money be redirected from the union to a charitable organization. 
 
"Union dues and fees amount to hundreds of dollars, which is heavy burden on middle income families who must make every dollar count. This survey shows that many workers do not believe they are getting value for their money. Right-to-work laws force unions to become more competitive for the right to represent workers,” Stacie Beck.
 
The Caesar Rodney Institute is a part of National Employee Freedom Week, a grassroots coalition of 72 members in 42 states. The objective is to educate the public about the need to offer workers in union settings the right to decide if they want to remain in the union or to allow their money to be used for political purposes or expenses the worker does not agree with.
 
The poll was conducted by Google Consumer Surveys, between July 11^th and July 31^st, 2014. It surveyed roughly 500 people and has a margin of error of approximately 3.76 percent.
 
The Caesar Rodney Institute (CRI) is a 501(c)(3) research and education organization dedicated to the measured improvement in the quality of life, the degree of individual liberty, and opportunity for personal fulfillment for all Delawareans.