University of California Workers Announce Two-Day Strike Over Wage and Affordability Concerns 

More than 86,000 University of California (UC) campus and health center employees will launch a two-day statewide strike on November 17 and November 18, 2025, according to a statement released on November 6, 2025. 

The employees are protesting against the UC’s alleged failure to settle contracts addressing the cost-of-living and affordability crises. 

AFSCME Local 3299, representing more than 40,000 UC service and patient care technical workers, and UPTE-CWA, which represents 21,000 healthcare, research, and technical professionals, are leading the strike. 

Around 25,000 UC nurses, represented by the California Nurse Association, will also join in solidarity, according to the statement. 

The strike is legally protected, AFSCME Local 3299 said in another statement, adding that the Labor Board has ruled that virtually all service and patient care workers can go on strike. 

A small number of employees will report to work, while some will be required to be on call for patients. 

AFSCME Local 3299 said its members have been priced out of local housing markets as wages have not kept pace with inflation. This has led to thousands of employees leaving their jobs and fueling the staff vacancy crisis at UC, the statement said. 

During the two years of bargaining, UC has lavished “exorbitant raises on its wealthiest executives,” spent billions of dollars to acquire new facilities, and funded housing assistance programs “to help the same ivory tower elites buy mansions or second homes,” AFSCME Local 3299 said. 

“Our members have had enough of UC’s serial elitism, tone deafness, and blatant disrespect for the workers who make this institution run,” said AFSCME Local 3299 President Michael Avant.

UC administrators lauded these workers as ‘essential heroes’ during the pandemic, Avant said. Yet, the workers are being excluded from housing assistance that UC has offered to its wealthiest employees, and face shrinking purchasing power compared to eight years ago. 

“It’s time for UC to get its priorities straight, and to treat us with the respect we’ve earned,” Avant added.   

The strike will include picket lines across all the UC campuses and health centers. 

UC Pushes Back on Union Claims

The UC called the planned strike “unnecessary and irresponsible,” warning it will disrupt students, patients, and vital research.

The UC has made every effort over 17 months of bargaining and three weeks of “intensive mediation” to arrive at a fair and competitive agreement, it said. 

The university said it had offered up to 7% in the first year of contract, stipends for health insurance premiums, and increased vacation-use protections. 

“Unfortunately, instead of working toward compromise, UPTE’s leadership has chosen confrontation over collaboration. Resorting to a strike does nothing to resolve the issues at hand — it only delays progress and harms the very people the union claims to support,” the UC said. 

The university urged UPTE leaders to return to the bargaining table and “engage constructively” instead of staging “costly and disruptive demonstrations.”