The California Labor Federation is dedicated to promoting and defending the interests of working people and their families for the betterment of California’s communities. From legislative campaigns to grassroots organizing, our affiliates are actively engaged in every aspect of California’s economy and government.
Our Structure
The California Labor Federation consists of 1,200 affiliated unions that voluntarily join together to help working people build better lives and futures for our families.
Most of our affiliated unions are also active with central labor councils or building trades councils at the county or regional level. These local bodies function as smaller labor federations that provide organizer training, coordination on legislative and political campaigns, and build progressive coalitions that speak out for social justice. For information about actions in your area, contact your central labor council. Click here for a list of councils.
Our Three Major Areas of Work
Legislative Action – Our unions help pass laws that protect California’s families and strengthen workers’ rights. California’s unions are active on legislative issues that matter to all Californians—in recent years, we have worked to reform our health care system, increase the minimum wage, and create a discount drug purchasing program for retirees.
Political Action – California’s unions make big political victories possible. Our members have made the critical difference in every recent election. We mobilize 20,000 union volunteers in each election cycle, and we turn out to vote at a rate of 10% higher than non-union voters.
Economic Action—In addition to the work our union members do to keep the economy going, we leverage our resources, our political power and our negotiating power to strengthen our unions. We support labor-employer-government partnerships to prevent layoffs, access public funding for training and help our workers compete in a changing world economy.