NEW YORK CITY—As the clock struck 12am on April 26, New York University (NYU) graduate workers brought the work they do to sustain the university to a halt and took to the picket line. The strike represents one step in the fight against capitalist exploitation. Changing—rather abolishing—this exploitative class relationship requires communist revolution through an international party, PLP.
Grad workers are fed up
These actions came after 10 months of unsuccessfully negotiating with NYU for a living wage, affordable healthcare, and protection for international students, just to name a few grievances. NYU, which sits on a $4.7 billion endowment and is one of the largest landlords and real estate developers in New York State, responded by deeming the strike “unwarranted, untimely, and regrettable.” For the university, graduate student workers who made $20/hr at up to 20hrs/week “are among the best compensated in the U.S.” (https://bit.ly/3b5g4Mo).
With high-spirits, graduate students are pressuring the university. Spirited chants such as “What’s disgusting? Union busting! What’s Outrageous? NYU wages!” fill the air while poignant speeches capture the hearts of supporters and curious onlookers. The bargaining demands highlight graduate workers’ understanding of the racist and sexist underpinnings that define and structure capitalism.
On the table, for example, are calls for NYU to cut ties with the NYPD, calls to protect international students from ICE and other Custom Border agents, and calls for support for workers with families. But these demands point to a world that the capitalist system can never provide. When NYU graduate student workers and auto workers from Mexico and nurses from Palestine run the world then we can have an egalitarian world. That’s communism. Let’s add that to our fight for higher wages and against racism.
Pressure on the NYU bosess
The strike so far has pressured NYU to make some concessions. More pressure from students and supporters alike is needed since the university is refusing to budge on several key issues such as wages (at one point the university offered an insulting $1 increase), tuition waivers for master students, and its NYPD ties. Fortunately, the graduate strikers remain undaunted, both at the bargaining table and on the picket line.
They have garnered attention from Democratic senator, Bernie Sanders, NY mayoral candidate, Diana Morales, and other liberal politicians. While support from these politicians attest to the strength of the strike, such support should make strikers wary of politicians who see these moments of struggle as an opportunity to channel workers' fight into U.S. imperialist support.
Like their counterparts at Columbia University and the striking nurses in Massachusetts, these striking graduate workers are demonstrating that it is pivotal that workers take to the streets if they want to gain even a modicum of crumbs from the bosses. Meaningful change will only come about under communism, however. Under communism, workers will no longer need to fight for basic necessities. Wages and profit will be abolished, along with the borders that perpetuate inequality. Racism and sexism will remain bloodsucking characteristics of a bygone capitalist order. The vision for a communist world, led by the revolutionary Progressive Labor Party, should guide all of our fights against the capitalist bosses.