The Univ. of California Academic Workers' Strike and its Meaning

by Dr. Victor Devinatz

The 48,000 academic workers who struck the University of California (UC) system (Nov. 14 to Dec. 23, 2022) was the largest academic strike in U.S. history. The work stoppage was illustrative of three 21st century U.S. labor relations trends:

• the transition of industrial unions to general unions;

• a greater number of strikes occurring in service industries; and

• highly educated/highly skilled employees organizing unions and participating in strikes.

The 2022 U.C. academic workers’ strike also demonstrates that elementary strike principles, such as achieving striker solidarity while gaining support among other unions and throughout the community, which have historically resulted in unions in manufacturing and related industries achieving victories in their strikes, were crucial to this walkout’s success.

While June 1979 represented the U.S. manufacturing employment peak at 19.6 million, by June 2019, employment in manufacturing had plummeted 35% to 12.8 million. With a concomitant increase in service industry employment over the past 40 years, industrial unions, such as the United Auto Workers (UAW), that have traditionally organized in manufacturing and related industries, have transitioned to general unions. These general unions organize workers of all skill levels across all industries. Over the last few decades, the UAW, the labor organization that led the 2022 UC system academic workers’ strike, has organized Legal Aid lawyers, undergraduate residential assistants, and academic workers, for example.

During the U.S. strike apex between 1946 and 1975, most walkouts took place in manufacturing or related industries. However, more strikes in the 21st century have occurred in service industries with the rise in service industry union membership. Besides the 2022 UC system academic workers’ strike, the 2018-2019 wave of US teacher strikes is also indicative of a greater number of service industry strikes.

The 2022 UC system academic workers’ strike took place among highly educated/highly skilled workers, who the public often views as privileged employees. In the past, doctoral students serving as graduate teaching/research assistants, as well as postdoctoral scholars who experienced low wages and inadequate benefits, viewed their current positions as apprenticeships because of the tenure-track faculty appointments awaiting them. Due to the erosion of tenure-track positions, many of these employees have become precarious workers who lack job security, earn poor wages, while receiving inadequate benefits as they work in temporary positions in academia. Thus, these employees have turned to trade unions to advance their employment interests.

The nearly 50,000 graduate teaching assistants, academic researchers and postdoctoral scholars who teach most undergraduate courses in the UC system struck over low wages and unsatisfactory benefits when negotiations that had begun in Spring 2021 failed to yield a contract. For example, as reported in Politico, Galen Liang, a graduate student in Berkeley’s Math Department, stated that nearly half his $2,700 monthly stipend goes towards rent and utilities, which leaves him with little money to pay his remaining bills.

The strike successfully halted classes, postponed research, and disrupted grading in the weeks before final examinations. Faculty support was crucial to the walkout’s success, with professors cancelling classes and with at least 200 professors agreeing to withhold grades until the strike’s conclusion. Local unions of the Teamsters, which represent some 53,000 United Parcel Service employees, agreed that they would forgo the delivery of shipments to the UC campuses during the strike. Additionally, construction workers who were represented by the Operating Engineers Union, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, and the Laborers’ Union halted work on the UC Berkeley campus in support of the strikers. The strike also received backing from U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) through Tweets. The Los Angeles Times published an editorial supportive of the academic workers prior to the strike. Additionally, though inconvenienced, most undergraduate students appeared to back the strikers’ demands.

The four bargaining units (across three UAW groups) settled at different times. A preliminary agreement was reached on November 29 for the 12,000 postdoctoral and academic researchers (UAW Local 5810) who remained on strike until the December 9 contract ratification. Major gains attained included a 20% to 23% salary increase, four additional weeks of paid parental and family leave, as well as childcare subsidies. The remaining 36,000 academic student workers and graduate teaching assistants (Student Researchers United – UAW and UAW Local 2865) obtained a tentative contract on December 16 with the UC system. Minimum pay increased from $23,250 to $34,000 for nine months of part-time employment, with improved childcare subsidies, as well as healthcare for dependents, among other contractual achievements.

The 2022 University of California academic workers’ strike demonstrates that organizing trade unions and conducting strikes can benefit highly educated whitecollar workers, which bodes well for trade unionism in a post-industrial society. In the 21st century’s third decade, we should expect to see more unionization and militancy among U.S. white-collar workers, such as technology industry workers, for example, as more of their jobs become increasingly precarious and proletarianized.

Dr. Victor G. Devinatz is Distinguished Professor of Management, specializing in labor relations, and was the Hobart and Marian Gardner Hinderliter Endowed Professor (2014-2015) at Illinois State University. He can be contacted at vgdevin@ilstu.edu.

At the U.C. Berkeley campus

Jim Wilson photo

Academic workers strike at UCLA for better pay and benefits for teaching assistants, postdoctoral scholars, graduate student researchers, tutors and fellows

Christina House photo

THIS PAGE: Academic workers strike at UCLA for better pay and benefits for teaching assistants, postdoctoral scholars, graduate student researchers, tutors and fellows (Christina House photo). OPPOSITE PAGE: At the U.C. Berkeley campus (Jim Wilson photo).