U of California Grad Students Strike

[mleok]

The agreement has been ratified,

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/23/us/university-california-workers-strike.html

Any sense from UC on a counterfactual... If the grad students had voted no, how long would the other academics who had already ratified their contracts remain on strike?

The reality is that the number of graduate students who were actually picketing was on the decline, so I doubt the sympathy strikers would have stuck it out for much longer if the tentative agreement was votedd down. In practice, the wage increase in dollar amounts that the graduate students secured were roughly comparable to that secured by the postdocs, so I doubt there would have been much support from the postdocs (who voted overwhelmingly for the agreement) to continue sympathetically striking.

[Parasaurolophus]

The agreement has been ratified,

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/23/us/university-california-workers-strike.html

Sounds like a good deal. In particular,

Starting pay will rise from roughly $22,000 to $35,500 for graduate student researchers, and about $23,000 to $34,000 for teaching assistants.

That's a major improvement, and seems perfectly reasonable.

Of course, if only they'd started by asking for $34-35k, then the UC would have immediately agreed and the strike would have been averted! (Or there'd have been a strike, but the UC would obviously have accepted their perfectly reasonable request of $34-35k. Obvs!)

[apl68]

The agreement has been ratified,

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/23/us/university-california-workers-strike.html

Sounds like a good deal. In particular,

Starting pay will rise from roughly $22,000 to $35,500 for graduate student researchers, and about $23,000 to $34,000 for teaching assistants.

That's a major improvement, and seems perfectly reasonable.

Of course, if only they'd started by asking for $34-35k, then the UC would have immediately agreed and the strike would have been averted! (Or there'd have been a strike, but the UC would obviously have accepted their perfectly reasonable request of $34-35k. Obvs!)

That was a major improvement in pay!  Most people around here would consider 35K good money.  Of course, you can buy a house here for what a year or two of rent would cost there.

[waterboy]

What this will lead to, I think, will be an overall decline in the numbers of graduate students. The pots of money to pay the additional funds are limited and grants only cover so much. Given that many PhDs never make it to the academy (if they so choose to try), the decline may not necessarily be a bad thing.

[Hibush]

The new stipend puts UC grad student stipends in the general range of the schools with which they compete for grad students. The stipends were completely out of whack, both relaltive to the competition and to the cost of scraping by as a grad student.

Some grad students think they can do a lot better. What is the dynamic behind that group, which seems to be focused at some of the smaller campuses.

Link But teaching assistants and other academic workers at UC Merced, UC Santa Cruz and UC Santa Barbara overwhelmingly rejected the proposed contract while majorities at the UC system's other campuses voted to approve it.

Graduate student researchers at Santa Cruz and Merced also voted against the agreement. At UC Santa Cruz, only about 20% of workers voted in favor of the contracts. At Merced, it was about a quarter of workers.

Student workers who opposed ratification said they were working to figure out next steps in a battle they see as just getting started.

"This is a fight that's going to continue. We're not done," said Mark Woodall, a UC Merced doctoral candidate in physics and chair of his UAW 2865 campus unit. "This has really invigorated people in a way who feel very disappointed in the outcome."

Are they out of touch with the big picture and marginalizing themselves? Are they following the recommendations of the World Socialists?  Are they the new leaders of a labor resurgence in California?

[mleok]

The new stipend puts UC grad student stipends in the general range of the schools with which they compete for grad students. The stipends were completely out of whack, both relaltive to the competition and to the cost of scraping by as a grad student.

Some grad students think they can do a lot better. What is the dynamic behind that group, which seems to be focused at some of the smaller campuses.

Link But teaching assistants and other academic workers at UC Merced, UC Santa Cruz and UC Santa Barbara overwhelmingly rejected the proposed contract while majorities at the UC system's other campuses voted to approve it.

Graduate student researchers at Santa Cruz and Merced also voted against the agreement. At UC Santa Cruz, only about 20% of workers voted in favor of the contracts. At Merced, it was about a quarter of workers.

Student workers who opposed ratification said they were working to figure out next steps in a battle they see as just getting started.

"This is a fight that's going to continue. We're not done," said Mark Woodall, a UC Merced doctoral candidate in physics and chair of his UAW 2865 campus unit. "This has really invigorated people in a way who feel very disappointed in the outcome."

Are they out of touch with the big picture and marginalizing themselves? Are they following the recommendations of the World Socialists?  Are they the new leaders of a labor resurgence in California?

I can sort of understand the resistance at UC Santa Cruz, since the housing market there is very tight, and they have a history of being dissatisfied with the UAW, with a wildcat strike in 2020 that was not authorized by the UAW. Santa Barbara's housing market is also very expensive, but they were not included in the handful of campuses with slightly higher wages. I don't understand the situation at Merced, given the very low cost of living there, but I was told that the local union leadership there has very socialist leanings that influenced the messaging to the students about whether to support the tentative agreement.

[mleok]

I do think that the extreme socialist viewpoints demonstrated in this article are out of touch with reality,

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/12/15/jlom-d15.html

Simply put, if the UC graduate students had put forth a ballot initiative that advocated for a $54K/year minimum wage for UC graduate students and the elimination of out-of-state tuition for graduate students, by increasing undergraduate tuition by the $6K/year it would cost to do so, it would have been soundly rejected at the ballot box. Simply put, most Californians are rent/housing burdened, and the idea that tuition should be increased substantially (around 40%) just so that a graduate student who is "hard at work" reading Proust all day can afford to spend only 30% of their income on rent, and not have to pay tuition is utterly disconnected with reality.

If nothing else, it creates perverse incentives to pay a humanities graduate student more than they could command post graduation. The net result will also mean that while a few more students would be much better off, many more students will be unfunded entirely and be much worse off.

[research_prof]

I do think that the extreme socialist viewpoints demonstrated in this article are out of touch with reality,

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/12/15/jlom-d15.html

Simply put, if the UC graduate students had put forth a ballot initiative that advocated for a $54K/year minimum wage for UC graduate students and the elimination of out-of-state tuition for graduate students, by increasing undergraduate tuition by the $6K/year it would cost to do so, it would have been soundly rejected at the ballot box. Simply put, most Californians are rent/housing burdened, and the idea that tuition should be increased substantially (around 40%) just so that a graduate student who is "hard at work" reading Proust all day can afford to spend only 30% of their income on rent, and not have to pay tuition is utterly disconnected with reality.

If nothing else, it creates perverse incentives to pay a humanities graduate student more than they could command post graduation. The net result will also mean that while a few more students would be much better off, many more students will be unfunded entirely and be much worse off.

@mleok, I could understand your argument about humanities, but what about engineering and computer science grad students who make several hundred thousands of dollars post graduation? How could a university attract such students?

I still believe that the UC grad student stipends are not competitive enough for humans that want to have an above the poverty life standard of living in CA. I am personally happy that UCs cannot resolve this situation (I am definitely sad for the students though), because my private university will be able to easily compete and attract grad students that could go to UCs.

[ciao_yall]

If nothing else, it creates perverse incentives to pay a humanities graduate student more than they could command post graduation. The net result will also mean that while a few more students would be much better off, many more students will be unfunded entirely and be much worse off.

Where would Amazon be without books to sell? Spotify without music to listen to? Facebook and other social media without a well-designed user interface?

Without content created by the arts and humanities, none of these tech companies would be worth a penny.

California is such a wealthy state because of its higher education system which produced so many advanced technology companies. Sadly, people like Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina, who don't seem to get that their wealth is BECAUSE of those high taxes, not in spite of them, they continue to haul up the ladder for everyone else.

[dismalist]

If nothing else, it creates perverse incentives to pay a humanities graduate student more than they could command post graduation. The net result will also mean that while a few more students would be much better off, many more students will be unfunded entirely and be much worse off.

Where would Amazon be without books to sell? Spotify without music to listen to? Facebook and other social media without a well-designed user interface?

Without content created by the arts and humanities, none of these tech companies would be worth a penny.

California is such a wealthy state because of its higher education system which produced so many advanced technology companies. Sadly, people like Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina, who don't seem to get that their wealth is BECAUSE of those high taxes, not in spite of them, they continue to haul up the ladder for everyone else.

California has been losing population for two decades.

[mleok]

I do think that the extreme socialist viewpoints demonstrated in this article are out of touch with reality,

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/12/15/jlom-d15.html

Simply put, if the UC graduate students had put forth a ballot initiative that advocated for a $54K/year minimum wage for UC graduate students and the elimination of out-of-state tuition for graduate students, by increasing undergraduate tuition by the $6K/year it would cost to do so, it would have been soundly rejected at the ballot box. Simply put, most Californians are rent/housing burdened, and the idea that tuition should be increased substantially (around 40%) just so that a graduate student who is "hard at work" reading Proust all day can afford to spend only 30% of their income on rent, and not have to pay tuition is utterly disconnected with reality.

If nothing else, it creates perverse incentives to pay a humanities graduate student more than they could command post graduation. The net result will also mean that while a few more students would be much better off, many more students will be unfunded entirely and be much worse off.

@mleok, I could understand your argument about humanities, but what about engineering and computer science grad students who make several hundred thousands of dollars post graduation? How could a university attract such students?

I still believe that the UC grad student stipends are not competitive enough for humans that want to have an above the poverty life standard of living in CA. I am personally happy that UCs cannot resolve this situation (I am definitely sad for the students though), because my private university will be able to easily compete and attract grad students that could go to UCs.

STEM students are generally hired on a higher step than the humanities students. For example, at UCSD, ECE students are appointed at step 8 on the scale, math students are appointed at step 6, whereas humanities students are appointed at step 1. I have no issue with adjusting the wages offered based on competition with other institutions, I have an issue with a minimum wage independent of field, candidacy status, and campus.

I should also add that a large fraction of STEM graduate students are international, from poorer countries like India and China, who are willing to forgo a higher stipend (so long as it is liveable, which it is if you're willing to have roommates), so as to get the UC name on their PhD, and obtain the STEM OPT that would allow them to obtain those high salaries post graduation.

But, at the end of the day, UC Merced is not going to compete with the likes of Caltech, MIT, or Stanford, irrespective of how high the stipends are, and how low the cost of living is.

[mleok]

These are the "non-negotiable demands" from the UC Workers Rank-and-File committee,

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/12/22/oxvw-d22.html

A minimum of $54,000 in base pay

Full COLA

Child care reimbursement of $2,000 per month

Concrete language for full and timely accommodations for disabled students

Reinstatement of free mass testing, and increased protections against COVID-19 infection

Drop all Non-Residential Supplemental Tuition (NRST) fees

UC housing rent capped at 30 percent of base wage

Five years of guaranteed on-campus housing

Full coverage for all dependents in UC health insurance

Rejection of a tier system and attempts to pit some campuses against one another

At the end of the day, the UC system is a public university system, and we cannot afford to offer $54K/year to a first-year humanities PhD student in Merced and waive out-of-state tuition for all graduate students. Simply put, postdocs and lecturers would be a much cheaper option if all the above demands were to pass.

[dismalist]

These are the "non-negotiable demands" from the UC Workers Rank-and-File committee,

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/12/22/oxvw-d22.html

A minimum of $54,000 in base pay

Full COLA

Child care reimbursement of $2,000 per month

Concrete language for full and timely accommodations for disabled students

Reinstatement of free mass testing, and increased protections against COVID-19 infection

Drop all Non-Residential Supplemental Tuition (NRST) fees

UC housing rent capped at 30 percent of base wage

Five years of guaranteed on-campus housing

Full coverage for all dependents in UC health insurance

Rejection of a tier system and attempts to pit some campuses against one another

At the end of the day, the UC system is a public university system, and we cannot afford to offer $54K/year to a first-year humanities PhD student in Merced and waive out-of-state tuition for all graduate students. Simply put, postdocs and lecturers would be a much cheaper option if all the above demands were to pass.

"We cannot afford ... ." The logic of a strike is extortion. Private sector strikes generally stop short of killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. Public sector strikes would too, of course, but the other side of the table is buying votes, so there's money in them thar' hills.  Where to stop? No one knows, so test the waters. A self-styled revolutionary movement, like our Troskyists, positively want the public sector to collapse so they can run it. Don't think that will happen. The strikers on average are too smart.

[ciao_yall]

If nothing else, it creates perverse incentives to pay a humanities graduate student more than they could command post graduation. The net result will also mean that while a few more students would be much better off, many more students will be unfunded entirely and be much worse off.

Where would Amazon be without books to sell? Spotify without music to listen to? Facebook and other social media without a well-designed user interface?

Without content created by the arts and humanities, none of these tech companies would be worth a penny.

California is such a wealthy state because of its higher education system which produced so many advanced technology companies. Sadly, people like Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina, who don't seem to get that their wealth is BECAUSE of those high taxes, not in spite of them, they continue to haul up the ladder for everyone else.

California has been losing population for two decades.

Really? Says who? Not the US Census.

[Wahoo Redux]

If nothing else, it creates perverse incentives to pay a humanities graduate student more than they could command post graduation. The net result will also mean that while a few more students would be much better off, many more students will be unfunded entirely and be much worse off.

Where would Amazon be without books to sell? Spotify without music to listen to? Facebook and other social media without a well-designed user interface?

Without content created by the arts and humanities, none of these tech companies would be worth a penny.

California is such a wealthy state because of its higher education system which produced so many advanced technology companies. Sadly, people like Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina, who don't seem to get that their wealth is BECAUSE of those high taxes, not in spite of them, they continue to haul up the ladder for everyone else.

California has been losing population for two decades.

Really? Says who? Not the US Census.

People have been exiting Cali and overwhelming the Pacific Northwest for more than two decades.  Cali is the main reason that the PNW livability (traffic, deforestation, overcrowding) has taken a tremendous hit and housing prices have ballooned by 500% in that part of the country.

We badly need people in the Rust Belt.  Send Californians here.  Stay out of the PNW, please.