General Stats

• In August 1881, 36 carpenters from 11 cities met in a Chicago warehouse and formed the United Brotherhood of Carpenters.
• Local 18 was the first UBC Local in Canada.  It was established on January 30^th, 1882 in Hamilton Ontario.
• There are 26 regional and district councils geographically aligned with today’s construction markets. There are seven in Canada and 19 in the United States. Each region oversees numerous individual local unions.
• Union members are encouraged to become involved in Carpenter politics, a nonpartisan, grass-roots-driven effort that supports candidates for their stances on issues, not party affiliation.
• The union’s founder, Peter J. McGuire, was the driving force behind creating the Labor Day holiday.
• More than 8 in 10 UBC members are registered to vote.
• The UBC represents and offers training to North America’s general carpenters, interior systems carpenters and drywallers, millwrights, floor coverers, millworkers and cabinetmakers, framing and residential carpenters, pile drivers, lathers, scaffolders, roofers, and workers in forest-product and related industries.
• The union actively promotes diversity within its ranks with programs that encourage women and other minorities and returning veterans to join the union.
• The union’s 100 affiliated pension funds control $45 billion in assets, and the union is an active investor that works for responsible corporate governance.
• Carpenter, the union’s membership magazine, began in 1881 and is one of the oldest continuously published magazines in North America.

Training Stats

• There are about 3,500 full- and part-time instructors associated with the Carpenters International Training Fund (CITF).
• The Carpenters International Training Center (ITC) was enlarged in 2002, 2006, 2007, 2009, and 2013 and today is a practical, hands-on learning facility with some 300 private dorm rooms, classrooms, trade shops, and exercise facilities. Currently, the ITC is over 1.2 million square feet with 150,000 square feet of shop space and over 70 classrooms.
• The ITC offers highly specialized member training for millwrights on gas or steam turbines. To date, over 18,000 members have attended turbine classes in Las Vegas.
• The UBC is meeting and exceeding our goal of having 10,000 or more journeymen a year attend our leadership programs to learn the skills needed to be a transformational leader who promotes a constructive culture on the jobsite, leading to increased productivity.
• More than $200 million a year is invested in providing apprenticeship training and upgrading the skills of UBC members, staff, and leadership.
• In 2001, the UBC opened its $100-million, 344,000-square-foot International Training Center (ITC), set on more than 27-acre campus in Las Vegas, to train members, staff, and instructors in hundreds of courses.
• UBC training is delivered through a network of more than 200 training centers across North America. Brotherhood training can aid members throughout their careers with courses designed for pre-apprentices, apprentices, journeymen, foremen, and superintendents.
• Brotherhood instructors from across North America travel to the Las Vegas facility for more than 100 train-the-trainer courses that are taught more than 300 times each year.
• Currently underway is the biggest curriculum overhaul in the union’s history, with more than 126 new course manuals published in just the last decade.
• In addition to the journeymen and apprentices, the UBC’s Collaborative Leadership program has a goal of at least 2,500 participants a year. These participants come from our signatory contractors throughout North America. They send their foremen, project managers, estimators, superintendents, and even VP’s and owners to learn the skills needed to be team builders and truly collaborative leaders.
• Thousands of third-year apprentices have come to the ITC to learn how important a strong union and robust construction industry are to their own futures.