Berkeley, CA, November, 14— Four union locals of the University of California striking workers (UAW) representing 48,000 Graduate Student and Postdoctoral workers walked out of the 10 campuses of the University of California (UC). This is the largest student-worker strike in U.S. history as it enters their third week. Progressive Labor Party (PLP) members have joined picket lines in Berkeley and Davis - passing out leaflets, distributing copies of CHALLENGE. We joined about 500 workers and students who militantly marched over a mile from 1½ miles from campus to the University President’s $6.5 million mansion in a fancy Berkeley neighborhood.
In a communist society we won’t need capitalists who perpetually squeeze us for more work and less pay. We don’t need the market competition that forces our living conditions down and down. In a communist society we can work as human beings to provide for one another’s needs – not for a wage.
Over the last 50 years graduate students have taken on more and more of the undergraduate teaching responsibilities and research while being paid as part-timers. There are fewer future tenure track positions to look forward to - so workers are fighting back. This need to strike reflects the growing crisis of capitalism worldwide as inter-imperialist rivalry intensifies. The capitalists' moves toward war dictate the intensifying economic and political control of key institutions like UC.
Graduate students now teach a larger percentage of first- and second-year undergraduate classes and low-paid instructors teach many upper-level ones. Full Professors now teach one graduate course, advise doctoral students and do research. Some beginning Academic Student Employees have a base pay of about $23,000 for what is technically a 20-hour work week but with preparation and grading it ends up being 40 hours/week or more. Then they must find time for their own studies and research. Some departments cover graduate student tuition and fees - for domestic students only - which raises compensation to $37K to $40K. They are demanding to be paid a minimum living wage of $54K with increases tied to the spiraling cost of housing.
Wages are the same statewide, but housing costs are nearly double in high rent urban areas like Berkeley and Los Angeles than in Merced. Not to mention capitalist development is happening internationally while the profit-driven system and infrastructure of the old world crumbles. This turnout on the picket lines and the support of undergraduate students and professors shows tremendous working class solidarity. This type of unity illustrates the power of the working class which could be used to overthrow capitalism and replace it with a worker-owned, worker-controlled communist society. There are demands for local transportation passes and childcare subsidies. All student workers are demanding more support for international students whose tuition/fees are triple or more than domestic students. There are 10 or more picket lines at the Berkeley campus that are being supported by workers all over the Bay Area. Garbage truck drivers have stopped pick-ups and UPS drivers stopped their deliveries.
These examples of class solidarity and fightback is a glimpse into the egalitarian world that workers can win if we continue to fight and build for it! Only communist leadership and learning can get us there!
