Swedish employees historically have been highly organised, with highs of over 85% trade union membership, a figure fairly consistent since the beginning of the twentieth century. Union membership exists even at the highest professional levels, such for judges and physicians. A contributing factor to this very high degree of organization, when compared internationally, can be seen as the fact that many social benefits, such as unemployment and sickness benefits, historically were administered by the unions. The Swedish state assumed complete responsibility for the sick pay system in the 1960’s, and reduced state subsidies to the union unemployment funds in 2006. After the reduction in 2006, union member density in the blue collar sector has dropped to 68% and in the white collar, 73% (2012)[3] attributed in part to the fact that the costs of the unemployment insurance as no longer state subsidized were passed onto the union members. At the time of this writing, the degree of membership density among employers is higher at 90% than among employees.