After the war a wave of strikes for higher wages swept the nation. Employers charged that unions had too much power, and Congress agreed. It passed laws outlawing the "closed shop" agreement, by which employers were required to hire only union members, and permitted states to enact "right-to-work" laws, which ban agreements requiring workers to join a union after being hired. In 1955 the AFL and CIO merged as a new organization, the AFL-CIO.
 

In recent decades there has been a decrease in the percentage of workers who join a union. Among the reasons are the decline of heavy industries, which were union strongholds, and the steady replacement of "blue-collar" workers by automation. Even so, organized labor remains a strong force in the U.S. economy and politics, and working conditions have steadily improved.

Meanwhile, the work force includes more women than ever before. And although the American work week typically amounts to between 35 and 40 hours, there are many departures from the norm: people working part-time or on "flexi-time" (for example, for four days they may work 10 hours a day instead of 7 or 8 and take the fifth day off) or "telecommuting" from their homes with the assistance of phone, computer, and facsimile (fax) machine.