American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 3299, the largest union in the University of California system, plans to begin a three day strike this week. AFSCME is the largest workers' union in California, and the UC system is the largest state employer, so the ongoing negotiations and the coming strike are important and have huge potential to affect all of California's workers.
AFSCME represents largely lower-income workers, including gardeners, cooks, drivers, custodians, lab techs, and nurse's aids, and these employees are disproportionately women, people of color, and immigrants. An expected 25,000 AFSCME workers will strike, with an equal number expected to join from the California Nurse's Association and the University Professional & Technical Employees union. (UC has requested, and obtained, a restraining order that bars "essential employees," including pharmacists and respiratory therapists, from joining picket lines.) The union that represents graduate student workers is not officially on strike because of contract agreements, but many graduate assistants and tutors are also expected to exercise their individual rights to join the strike.
The action is taken in response to a recent study and report written by the AFSCME Local 3299 which showed a widening income gap between the highest and lowest wage earners in the system, including the particularly damning statistic that the "share of total payroll cost for UC’s top 10% of wage earners grew from 22% to 31%, while the share for the bottom 50% dropped from 24% to just 22%." The study also found that "UC's highest-paid administrators include a higher proportion of whites and men than the State of California while its lowest-paid workers are mainly people of color and women."
The scale of income disparity, especially as that disparity is so obviously skewed along racial and gender demographics, is unconscionable and particularly egregious in the UC system, though it should be noted that such disparity is not abnormal within academic institutions.
AFSCME's requests in bargaining with the UC management were for wage increases, benefits protections, job security, and ending this discrimination. The raises that have been offered, paired with other cuts within the system, have been deemed unacceptable, and the union voted to strike back in April.
In addition to the large nature of the union action, this strike is also important because it represents solidarity from higher paid workers, such as those represented by the CNA, with the lower-wage workers of AFSCME. Workers with higher salaries and better protections within the institutions are joining the fight, an absolute necessity for true change.
We stand in solidarity with workers in the UC System as they fight for equality and fairness in the workplace.
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