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The UCLA Labor Center, or the Center for Labor Research and Education, was established as an institute that would consolidate the workers’ movement in California with its working-class communities. The center is composed of different programs in order to resolve issues that are face by different workers in particular settings.

History
Former California Governor Earl Warren established the Institute for Research on Labor and Employment in 1945 at two California college campuses. One campus that would include an industrial relations unit at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and the other unit would be at the University of California, Berkeley. The establishment of this institute was to recognize the power and importance of organized labor in California politics.

In 1964, the establishment of the Center for Labor Research and Education at UCLA, commonly known as the UCLA Labor Center, further united the labor movement and higher education institutes. Those that authored this new subgroup focused on key issues like job displacement, the needs of white-collar unions, reducing hours of work, and the problems of the unemployed. Although the program has faced many possibilities of being eliminated due to budgetary concerns during Arnold Schwarzenegger's term as California's governor, the Center for Labor Research and Education has experienced the largest growth in staff and funding in its fifty-year history, following the establishment of the statewide Institute for Labor and Employment (IRLE) in 2000. The expansion led to new programs and a new labor center in Downtown Los Angeles that continually strive to strengthen the relationship between workers and their movements with the working-class communities.Today, California fully funds the programs and research of the UCLA Labor Center.

Mission
The UCLA Labor Center has stated that it will bring together workers’ community and policymakers in order to address the labor issues. The research, education, and policy work the center creates is meant to improve working conditions and standards, create adequate jobs for the community, and strengthen the workers’ rights, including immigrant workers.

Projects
The major projects that the UCLA Labor Center works on to target labor issues include:
 * Dream Resource Center promotes higher education and equal access to it
 * Global Solidarity Project unites with labor leaders to address transnational labor issues
 * Los Angeles Black Worker Center promotes grassroots leadership to address the job crisis
 * Re: Work Institute for Worker Justice works to improve conditions of low-wage industries
 * UCLA Labor and Workplace Studies Minor trains students to properly address workplace issues

Downtown Labor Center
The UCLA Downtown Labor Center opened in 2002 on Park View Street, Los Angeles, California. This new center was to better serve the needs of immigrant workers in the city of Los Angeles. Kent Wong the director of the UCLA Labor Center believed that by bringing establishing a new center in the core of the city it could make a bigger impact on labor issues. Some of the programs that this particular center has established help train minority workers to organize themselves when demanding better working conditions.