How the most successful private-sector union local in the nation does it

The Las Vegas-based Culinary Workers union has amassed a remarkable record of success. Even more remarkably, it's done it in a right-to-work state.

I have seen the future, and it is Las Vegas.

The future of what, you ask. Well, gambling, obviously. But I was thinking more about organized labor.

For people of a certain age, any juxtaposition of “Las Vegas” and “organized labor” summons memories of former Teamsters President Jackie Presser being carried through Caesar’s Palace in a sedan chair. During the 1980s, this image was an emblem of union corruption and decadence. Before the decade was out, the Teamsters would be placed into federal receivership, where it remained until 2020. That’s not what I’m talking about.

I’m talking instead about the Culinary Workers, local 226 of UNITE HERE, the union created in 2002 by the merger of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial, and Textile Employees (UNITE) and the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union (HERE). The Culinary Workers is the most successful private-sector union local in the country. It has tripled its membership during the past three decades; it has created a health care plan for its members with no premium and no deductibles; and, according to retiring secretary-treasurer (i.e., leader) Geoconda Argüello-Kline, it has returned to work more than 80 percent of its members who were laid off at the start of the pandemic. What is most remarkable about the Culinary Workers is that the union local has amassed these achievements in a state (Nevada) that has been right-to-work since 1952. Right-to-work states bar unions from collecting fees from nonmembers within their bargaining unit to cover their portion of collective bargaining costs, thereby incentivizing workers to quit their unions and become free riders, thereby draining union treasuries. According to Argüello-Kline, this strategy hasn’t worked on the Culinary Workers, whose membership encompasses about 97 percent of its bargaining units. (That’s a lot.)

How do the Culinary Workers do it? On the occasion of Argüello-Kline’s retirement, I interviewed her about this and other matters for the New Republic. You can read that here.