The Laborers International Union is leaving the AFL-CIO, reports Associated Press. The split is about national politics and strategy, not workplace issues. If the other “Change to Win” unions are any example, the divorce at the national level will have a pretty small impact on the state and local level where most everything is done except financing and stumping for presidential candidates. Certainly, local officials told the Business Press last summer that they planned to keep co-operating.

The Laborers had tried to keep a foot in both camps after last year’s split, which saw the Teamsters and the SEIU split from the national organization over whether enough money was being put into organizing new members. Critics said the AFL-CIO had put too much effort into a failed campaign to elect a Democrats to Congress and the White House.

The Laborers International, reports the wire service, has seen a big shift to Latino membership in recent years and that’s certainly happened in Las Vegas. Top union officials also complain that wages have fallen in recent years.

And this is really another episode in the slow sapping of union strength over the last 30 or 40 years. Unions have been very slow to change and have only recently caught up with changes in the workforce. Where they are still missing out, is being able to deliver. Unions like the Teamsters and the Autoworkers were strongest when they delivered. Union membership no longer guarantees those kind of benefits across an industry and so workers see less value in joining. And that’s before we get to the political complications of whether Democrats really represent union interests.