A composite index measuring the structural preconditions for collective action formation, operationalizing McAlevey's (2016) whole-worker organizing framework as a weighted combination of sector-level marketplace bargaining power (Silver, 2003) at 55% and unorganized labor reserve at 45%. Scores are normalized against an absolute national benchmark — not relative rankings — preserving cross-county comparability independent of filter state.

Electoral scores and Infrastructure Score are intentionally excluded from the OOS formula. Combining organizing potential with electoral value would conflate two analytically distinct questions, corrupting both measurements.

County-level weighted summation of sector-specific Strategic Value Scores (SVS), normalized to an absolute benchmark. Implements Silver's (2003) marketplace bargaining power thesis: workers' structural position in production — specifically their capacity for disruptive action — is the primary determinant of leverage, independent of organizational density or political will. A county's sectoral composition is thus the foundational structural variable.

Known gap: County Business Patterns excludes government workers by design. Government-heavy counties (DC, state capitals) are systematically understated.

Sector-level boolean rubric operationalizing chokepoint theory (Clawson & Clawson, 1999; Silver, 2003) and McAlevey's (2016) community embeddedness thesis. Points are assigned for: Chokepoint Potential (25 pts) — capacity to disrupt essential flows; Crisis-Creating (20 pts) — a stoppage creates visible public harm; McAlevey Priority (20 pts) — explicitly identified in the whole-worker framework; Community-Facing (15 pts) — workers are embedded in the social fabric beyond the workplace; Non-Offshoreable (10 pts) — cannot be geographically displaced. A ×1.15 multiplier applies when Chokepoint=YES AND Community-Facing=YES, reflecting empirical evidence that these two dimensions produce non-additive leverage when combined.

Measures the size of the available unorganized labor pool — total county employment minus estimated union members, scaled by the county's share of national employment. Operationalizes McCarthy & Zald's (1977) classical resource mobilization concept of "available population": the raw material for movement formation, analytically independent of structural leverage quality. Combined with SVS, it produces the OOS.

Known ceiling: ~2,192 LM-2 union locals (~20% of filers) are unresolvable due to PO boxes, international addresses, or territories. Union member counts in every county are floors, not ceilings.

Electoral college leverage score combining state-level swing weight (derived from historical presidential margin tightness and Electoral College value) with county-level 2024 presidential margin. Implements spatial targeting logic from electoral studies literature: organizing resources have highest marginal electoral value in counties within competitive states that are themselves competitive (Hersh, 2015; Enos & Fowler, 2018). State weights: PA/WI=100, AZ/NV=90, GA/MI=85, NC/TX=70, FL=60, others scaled. 28 counties — mostly Alaska boroughs — have no election data.

State-level competitive index for statewide office (Senate, governor) derived from historical margin tightness and Cook Political Report ratings. Based on the theoretical premise that labor mobilization has asymmetric electoral returns — high in competitive states, near-zero in noncompetitive states (Key, 1949; Ansolabehere et al., 2006). Critical validity limitation: gubernatorial, Senate, and presidential races each require distinct intervention logic. This sub-score does not distinguish between them — race-specific targeting is a Phase 2 refinement.

District-level competitiveness score incorporating Cook Political Report ratings and MIT Election Lab historical margins. Includes positive weighting for safe Democratic districts with vulnerable incumbents, reflecting strategic literature on primary elections as an accountability mechanism within legislative bodies (Boatright, 2013). This is a normative model choice: primary challenges are treated as a legitimate tool for legislative accountability.

Two-dimensional organizational capacity measure: Organized Scale — total union members (raw count, scaled), capturing deployable political resources; Union Culture — union density (members/total employment), capturing the normalized social acceptance of collective action, which Bronfenbrenner (2009) identifies as a significant predictor of new organizing success. Deliberately excluded from the OOS formula: density is an outcome of past strategy, not a predictor of future organizability. Including it would introduce circular measurement.

Categorical classifier derived from the infrastructure–opportunity matrix, drawing on social movement theory's distinction between mobilization (activating existing resources) and organization-building (creating new resources) as distinct strategic modes with different resource requirements and timelines (McCarthy & Zald, 1977; McAlevey, 2016). Prevents the common error of applying uniform resource allocation to structurally dissimilar terrains.

McAlevey's (2016, 2020) whole-worker framework argues that durable political power requires organizing workers as complete social beings embedded in their communities — not merely as economic actors. The framework predicts that sectors with both chokepoint leverage and community embeddedness generate superior long-run political capacity compared to sectors with leverage alone. This is in direct theoretical tension with the Strategic Sector Initiative (SSI), which prioritizes manufacturing based on industrial organization theory. This model sides with McAlevey — the SVS rubric encodes her sector hierarchy, and the ×1.15 multiplier operationalizes her core claim about the non-additive effect of combining leverage with community presence.

Key citations: McAlevey (2016) No Shortcuts; McAlevey (2020) A Collective Bargain; Silver (2003) Forces of Labor (chokepoint theory alignment).

Theoretical distinction between two principal counterparties in labor strategy: private-sector employers — profit-maximizing actors amenable to cost-benefit negotiation, where workplace disruption creates measurable material losses; and political actors — responsive to electoral, ideological, and reputational incentives, capable of ideological intransigence even at substantial material cost (principal-agent theory; public choice literature). Empirically validated by cases where conventional labor leverage failed against ideologically committed political actors: Walker (WI, 2011), DeSantis (FL, 2022). The electoral sub-scores exist precisely because political actors require a different pressure mechanism — the ballot box, not the picket line alone.

Systematic documentation of measurement validity threats (Cook & Campbell, 1979). The model cannot operationalize: associational power (Levi, 1996), organic leader network centrality, employer-specific financial vulnerability (Bronfenbrenner, 2009), local political contingency, or internal union democracy. These represent genuine construct validity gaps that structural administrative data cannot close — they require ethnographic, participatory, and field research methods. The model is a structural prioritization instrument, not a substitute for ground-level political intelligence.