Responding to my piece, Jonathan Chait writes that unions are paltry players compared to the big, bad business lobby when it comes to buying influence in Washington and state capitols.
Here are the ten largest donors in U.S. politics as of February 7, according to OpenSecrets.Org:
ActBlue: $51 million
AT&T: $46 million
AFSCME: $43 million
National Association of Realtors: $38 million
Goldman Sachs: $33 million
American Association for Justice: $33 million
International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers: $33 million
National Education Association: $32 million
Laborers Union: $30 million
Teamsters Union: $30 million
That’s five unions to two businesses and three other groups. Five out of ten is half, by my always-suspect English-major math. And who are those other groups? ActBlue is a Democratic clearinghouse, the trial lawyers are super-lopsidedly Democratic, and four out of five of the Realtors’ top campaign-cash recipients are Democrats.
Put another way, the list reads:
Democratic/Union Goon proxy: $51 million
Death Star, Inc.: $46 million
Union Goons (public sector): $43 million
The Committee to Re-Inflate the Bubble by Electing Democrats: $38 million
The Bankers Who Elected Barack Obama: $33 million
Democratic trial lawyers: $33 million
Union Goons: $33 million
Union Goons (public sector): $32 million
Union Goons: $30 million
Union Goons: $30 million
An important difference not reflected by the gross numbers: The union goons, especially in the public sector, are near-monolithic in their political interests. (See if you can spot the red on AFSCME’s party-split chart. Or play “Spot the Republican” on its list.) The business lobby is not: FedEx and UPS both do a lot of lobbying, but it is in the course of each trying to hose the other. The public-sector unions are a uniquely problematic special-interest group.
— Kevin D. Williamson is a deputy managing editor of National Review and author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Socialism, just published by Regnery. You can buy an autographed copy through National Review Online here.