Oddly enough, most job growth in right-to-work states

National Right to Work via Doug Ross:

Why, this must be some sort of strange coincidence:

Currently, the U.S. has 22 right-to-work states. All of them are in the South, West, and Central Midwest. During the past 15 years, these states have collectively outperformed the rest of the nation to an almost embarrassing degree:

• “From 1995 to 2005, incomes of residents in right-to-work states grew by 142 percent more than the incomes of Ohioans,” and “private-sector job growth was 500% greater.”

• After passing right-to-work legislation in 1986 and 2001, respectively, Idaho and Oklahoma both experienced explosive growth in their economies and overall employment.

• An after-tax dollar earned in a right-to-work state has more real purchasing power than it does in other states, “because union labor tends to raise (the) costs of goods and services.”

I took a look at economic growth in the individual states during the past decade as measured by gross domestic product (GDP). What I found also shows that right-to-work states clearly outperformed the others [see table at right]…

…2001-2010 economic growth weighted by average population in all right-to-work states was 21.7%; in the rest of the states and the District of Columbia, it was only 13.6%. During the past thirty years, the tremendous leads in per-capita GDP industrial states like Ohio and Michigan once had over the right-to-work states have mostly and in a few cases entirely evaporated.

Whooda thunkit? Go read the rest.