Labor of Love 2025 will be held June 7-9 in Williamsburg, VA. Stay tuned for more details.

A VALUE-CENTRIC BUILDING TRADES

NABTU is dedicated to the stability of employment and economic security of organized construction workers in North America. The private investments made by our unions and our signatory contractors have created the most renowned apprenticeship training and education infrastructure found anywhere in the world. NABTU also works in close partnership with a wide array of industries to seek and secure a wide array of public policy challenges that lead to greater economic development across America.

Independent data shows unionized construction productivity and their workforce development programs can't be beat

The latest research shows that unionized Construction Productivity is 14 percent higher, and our labor costs are four percent lower than nonunion.

BUILDING TRADES UNION MEMBERSHIP IN THE U.S. CONTINUES TO RISE

Despite macroeconomic headwinds, including high interest rates that provided challenges for project sponsors and investors, building trades union membership continues to rise. We proudly announce that NABTU affiliates achieved a net membership growth of 49,554 in 2024. This increase, combined with 2023’s record growth, marks the most significant consecutive expansion of the building trades since the 1950s. This is not surprising given the trend found in the recent Institute for Construction Employment Research (ICERES) study analyzing union membership rates within America’s skilled construction trades over the last 10 years. This analysis fills an important information gap on construction union activity given the shortcomings of the two most-cited sources of union data in the United States: the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ annual report and the site unionstats.com.

NABTU possesses and maintains a culture and a set of fundamental values that bind all of us collectively as the world’s finest skilled craft professionals. And that culture also connects with a fierce advocacy for community wage and benefit standards that properly reward such work…all of which helps to build stronger communities, more productive industries, and a healthier and more prosperous nation”

Sean McGarvey
NABTU President

PROGRAMS

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