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But US workers can’t organize freely the same way that Danish workers can, despite the pretenses to freedom of association. The US has mostly moved on from the practice of outright murdering union organizers and deploying the army to attack striking workers, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t still a legal regime that is immensely hostile towards organizing themselves.

From the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947—which outlaws all sorts of strikes and lets states ban union shops—to Janus v. AFSCME in 2018–which blocks unions from entering into exclusive supplier contracts with firms—the US legal apparatus is deeply, profoundly hostile to labor organizing. (This legal regime makes a mockery of the idea that Americans enjoy a “free” market, so to maintain the friction, ideologues are employed to convince everyone that labor unions are little cartels rather than the simple equivalent of labor-selling firms.)

Add on top of that the enormous (and often formally illegal) efforts by private firms to prevent the formation of unions, and we see how labor unions could represent such a small number of US workers despite the large and growing popularity of union organizing.

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/2022-in-review/as-pro-union-sentiment-reaches-a-fifty-year-high-us-law-remains-pro-management

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