Checkbox value is always 'on'

this is my checkbox

HTML

<label class="checkbox">
    <input id="eu_want_team" name="eu_want_team" type="checkbox">
</label>

JQuery

var eu_want_team = $('#eu_want_team').val();
alert(eu_want_team);

Its always displaying ON, is it checked or not. Whats the problem with it?

Use .is(':checked') instead: Working jsFiddle

var eu_want_team = $('#eu_want_team').is(':checked');
alert(eu_want_team);

or as @Itay said in comments you can use jQuery's .prop() to get the checked property value:

alert($("#eu_want_team").prop("checked"));

<label class="checkbox">
    <input id="eu_want_team" name="eu_want_team" type="checkbox" value="somevalue">
</label>

<script>
   var ele = document.getElementById("eu_want_team");
   if(ele.checked)
   alert(ele.value)

</script>

This will work :

if ($('#element').is(":checked")) {
    eu_want_team = 1;
} else {
    eu_want_team = 0;
}
alert(eu_want_team);

Have a quick look at this answer for checking if a checkbox is checked.

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/901712/check-checkbox-checked-property-using-jquery

But basically you want to do something like below to check its value:

if ($("#element").is(":checked")) {
  alert("I'm checked");
}

i think this is what you want to do

$("#eu_want_team").click(function(){
    alert($(this).is(':checked')); 
}

Try this

if ( $('#element').is(':checked')){
    alert(element);
   }