Reps. Paul Luebke and Ty Harrell support $483 million coming into the state's economy.

That figure was the centerpiece of a news conference the Democrats held Tuesday to express their support for the Employee Free Choice Act, also known as the card check bill.

Luebke and Harrell said in what is sure to be a polarizing claim that if 5 percent more of the state's workers were in unions, they would earn $483 million more in wages, assuming that union workers make eight percent. Those workers would then have more money to spend in the economy.

"We are always happy to have more people working and working at higher wages," said Luebke, of Durham.

The estimates on new wages come from a study by the Center for American Progress Action Fund. The center is a liberal think tank that supports the card check bill.

A builders' group sponsoring robocalls against Kay Hagan is fighting a bill making it easier to unionize.

The Associated Builders and Contractors Free Enterprise Alliance, a Washington-based contractors lobbying association, paid for automated calls to North Carolina residents criticizing the Democratic Senate candidate's record on spending.

The calls are ostensibly issue-oriented, asking listeners to call Hagan about state spending.

Chris Singerling, director of political affairs for the alliance, said that "fiscal restraint at all levels of government" is a key issue for the commercial and industrial contractors in its membership.

At the national level, the group is also concerned about the Employee Free Choice Act, a bill that would make it easier to unionize companies by allowing a "card-check" system rather than a private ballot.

Singerling argued that would make it easier for pro-union employees to pressure coworkers.

"It's absolutely un-American," he said. "You can go and vote for your elected officials on Election Day privately, and no one would know how you voted. But when it comes to your own job, you wouldn't have that right."

The card-check bill passed the House in 2007 but failed narrowly in the Senate.

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole voted against the bill, while Hagan told the News & Record's editorial board that she would look on the idea "favorably" but stopped short of a full-throated endorsement.

Update: Hagan spokeswoman Colleen Flanagan said that she supports the bill as a way to "level the playing field for working families."

"Right now, employees can unionize by either a secret ballot or a card check, but the employer is essentially allowed to decide which method will be officially recognized," she wrote in an e-mail to Dome. "This bill simply allows the workers, not the employers, to decide which method to use, and stiffens penalties for intimidation."