Re:MIT graduate students vote to unionize
by jkaplowitz on Saturday April 09, 2022 @12:35PM
(#30969497)
> What do you mean? Just get 30% of your members to sign a petition and you can hold an election to change unions. That is literally what organizing is.
> If you can get 30% of your members to go on a "wildcat strike" against UC Santa Cruz & UAW, then you can get 30% to sign a union replacement card.
Are you speaking based on California public sector union law or the federal National Labor Relations Act? The federal NLRA doesn't apply to state public sector workplaces, including UC Santa Cruz, with that being handled by state law.
Re:MIT graduate students vote to unionize
by whimsicalism on Saturday April 09, 2022 @12:38PM
(#30969521)
My only experience with unionization is at private universities in Massachusetts, so I guess I am unfamiliar with how state law plays in for these public sector unions in California.
UAW set it up so that the entire UC system votes on these contracts. This leads to situations where you have large student protests at union meetings followed by students at other campuses voting to ratify the contract, and then entire campuses holding unauthorized strikes in protest of the contract they just "voted for".
If things were department wide, or even campus wide, the UAW wouldn't last a year in the departments I'm familiar with.
Instead, what you're proposing would require a statewide campaign against one of the most powerful political groups in California. The UAW is well aware of this, and has no incentive to act in its members' interest.
> the union negotiated pay for that campus below the cost of living
...and the graduate student workers voted to approve the contract? Every negotiated contract goes back to the members for approval.
What would this have looked like in the absence of a union? You are saying that with negotiation, UC Santa Cruz got pay below cost of living, but if they didn't have that negotiation, management would have freely paid them more than cost of living? What was the negotiation over?
> In particular, organizing a strike against the union, or organizing a replacement union would have been illegal.
What do you mean? Just get 30% of your members to sign a petition and you can hold an election to change unions. That is literally what organizing is.
If you can get 30% of your members to go on a "wildcat strike" against UC Santa Cruz & UAW, then you can get 30% to sign a union replacement card.