As the latest data show unionization rates declining, a new EPI report examines the union busting campaigns at Starbucks, Amazon, and Trader Joe’s to show how corporations routinely employ legal and illegal tactics to defeat worker organizing efforts.  

Workers at Starbucks, Amazon, and Trader Joe’s have encountered multibillion-dollar corporations who are prepared to do whatever is necessary to crush their organizing campaigns. Unlawful acts have taken multiple forms, including: 

• Terminating union activists and supporters; 

• Closing unionized facilities in order to send a message to workers in other facilities who might want to organize; 

• Providing wage increases and benefit improvements to nonunion workers but denying them to workers in stores and workplaces that have voted for unions; 

• Reducing workers’ hours to the point they no longer qualify for health care and other essential benefits

Starbucks in particular has engaged in an enormous unlawful union-busting campaign. According to data from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB):  

• As of February 2024, NLRB regional offices have docketed 771 open or settled unfair labor practice (ULP) charges filed with the agency against Starbucks or its law firm, Littler Mendelson. 
• As of December 2024, 31 administrative law judges, four National Labor Relations Board Members, two federal district judges, and 10 federal appellate judges have issued a total of 113 decisions ordering relief for unfair labor practices by Starbucks. Collectively, these decisions have ordered reinstatement for at least 73 Starbucks employees. 

As previous EPI research has shown, the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) fails to provide penalties sufficient to deter employer violations. Further, employers spend more than $400 million per year on “union-avoidance” consultants.

“These ferocious anti-union campaigns show why it is so difficult for workers in the U.S. to form new unions and negotiate first contracts, especially when they are up against powerful, law-breaking corporations. As long as unlawful union busting pays off, union density will continue to decline,” said John Logan, professor at San Francisco State University and author of the report.