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Thousands of University of California health care workers began a two-day strike across California on Wednesday.
“UC employees in frontline services and patient care will strike on November 20 and November 21, 2024 to protest UC’s bad faith bargaining and unfair labor practices,” the AFSCME Local 3299 union said on its website. Posted on the site.
The union claims UC representatives illegally negotiated to leave workers with no choice but to strike.
Some of the more than 37,000 UC health care workers who went on strike at 6 a.m. outside the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center in Westwood told KTLA they were living paycheck to paycheck and had had enough. spoke.
Health care workers striking outside the University of California, Irvine on November 20, 2024 (KTLA)
One woman said she earns less than a fast-food worker. “We come to work every day, risking our lives. We still come, but we don’t make any money…It’s very stressful,” Jennifer said Wednesday morning.
Union officials claimed that low wages forced some workers to endure hours-long commutes or even sleep in their cars.
Another striking worker said that when patients arrive at the hospital, they sometimes have to wait 35 to 45 minutes to be triaged. “Since COVID-19, our patient numbers have increased, but our staff has not increased,” Herbert said.
University officials have denied allegations of unfair bargaining tactics and said they have proposed a university-wide wage increase to $25 an hour by July 1, 2025.
They accuse union leaders of declaring an impasse “despite a clear intention to continue negotiating contract terms.”
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