Their membership has doubled to about 3,500 in the last 9 years, and the main reason seems to be health insurance. I asked an editor of a healthcare newsletter whether to get my insurance through the EFA or NWU, and she suggested the EFA by a slight edge. They offer contract advice to magazine and book authors. It's like a lawyer's letter. Of course, if the publisher tells the Union grievance officer to buzz off, you have to take them to small claims court after all.
Some chapters have good local meetings and activities.
People from Boston who relocate to New York tell me that they are disappointed with the NY chapter. The NY chapter once had very good monthly meetings for business writers, science writers, magazine writers, etc. The NY local is organizing a series of workshops in NYC for fiction writers and poets, but they've been slighting the needs of working writers. See the Village Voice . It has the worst bureaucracy of any writers' organization.