94% of workers say their paychecks are not keeping up with the cost of living. Four in five say politicians are not showing up for them. The AFL-CIO's response is 50,000 trained election protectors deployed in yellow vests at battleground-state polling locations, a worker-first endorsement standard that holds Democrats and Republicans equally accountable, and one of the largest political ground games the federation has mounted in many years.

On today's episode of America's Work Force Union Podcast, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Fred Redmond joins for the first installment of Friday with Fred to discuss the unanimous AFL-CIO Executive Council position on the November 3rd election, the election protection program running through at least seven days after the election, the 2 million new member organizing goal set at the June convention that Redmond describes as the floor not the ceiling and why seven in ten Americans have supported unions for five consecutive years.

Visit aflcio.org for more and read Liz Shuler's State of the Workers address.

He spent eight and a half years writing for Jimmy Kimmel, went on strike twice with the Writers Guild and watched a well-organized union deliver real results. Then he went to medical school, became an ER doctor at UCLA, and watched conditions worsen every year for 11 years. Now he is one of the organizers behind UC Doctors United — an effort to unionize nearly 10,000 attending physicians across the University of California system, the only group at UCLA Health currently without union protection.

On today's episode of America's Work Force Union Podcast, UC Doctors United organizer Dr. Jacob Lentz discusses the organizing drive, why it is about patient care and not physician pay, what his Writers Guild experience taught him about what unions actually do and how he is making the case to colleagues who have spent careers being told unions are the problem.

Visit ucdoctorsunited.org for more.

At Ellis Island in the early 1900s, the Bricklayers' union was advertising to arriving immigrants. The biggest selling point beyond wages was the eight-hour workday, because the workers coming over had been working 12- and 14-hour days. That was a union promise. The eight-hour workday, the 40-hour workweek and OSHA all exist because unions fought for them. Every American worker has benefited, union member or not.

On today's Trades Day episode of America's Work Force Union Podcast, Mechanical Insulators LMCT Executive Director Pete Ielmini discusses the LMCT's presence at the Association of Energy Engineers World Energy Conference and Expo in Orlando, where a live bare-pipe demonstration showed $300 to $400 in annual energy loss per uncovered foot and a game show format packed the room. He also updates the Federal Mechanical Insulation Act — passed in the House on the suspension calendar, four Senate co-signers and a closing legislative clock — and reflects on what the labor movement built for every worker in this country.

Visit mechanicalinsulatorslmct.com for more.