[1][4] It is the largest non-employer based affiliate union and workers' group in the United States, with a self-reported membership of 5 million individuals.

The organization recruits people in working-class neighborhoods on their doorsteps in an effort to persuade them to support labor-backed candidates at election time.

Instead, it was to be a "neighborhood-based, membership organization affiliated with the labor movement... [that] will give working Americans who do not belong to unions the platform and the tools to join together and have their voices heard... canvassers will go door-to-door to educate, recruit members, and mobilize working families around important national, state, and local issues such as jobs, health care, and education".

[15] [16]Working America activists were credited by the press and Democrats for helping to deliver federal and state victories in Ohio and Pennsylvania.

The effort built upon a previous campaign by Working America in mid-2006 in which the organization asked the public to submit stories about "bad bosses.