ANALYSIS: Cannabis Workers Make Retail Sector a New Union Haven

Unions attempting to organize retail-industry workplaces won more elections in 2021 than they have in almost 20 years. And they owe that surprising success mostly to cannabis workers.

The National Labor Relations Board’s year-end election figures show that retail is the only industry group where unions are organizing workers much more successfully than they did before the pandemic began. Retail unions prevailed in 60 representation elections overseen by the NLRB last year, up from 37 in 2020 and 34 in 2019.

The proliferation of cannabis growers and dispensaries has made this trend possible, buoyed by state marijuana laws that contain ...