International Longshore and Warehouse Union

The International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) is a labor union which primarily represents dock workers on the West Coast of the United States, Hawaii and Alaska, and in British Columbia, Canada. It also represents hotel workers in Hawaii, cannery workers in Alaska, warehouse workers throughout the West and bookstore workers in Portland, Oregon. The union was established in 1937 after the 1934 West Coast Waterfront Strike, a 3-month-long strike that culminated in a 4-day general strike in San Francisco, California, and the Bay Area. It disaffiliated from the AFL-CIO on August 30, 2013. In 2014, the San Francisco Chronicle described the ILWU as "the aristocrat of the working class; a top member can earn over well over [sic] $100,000 a year with excellent benefits", with vacancies receiving thousands or sometimes even tens of thousands of applications.