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Berkeley demonstration for $15 at site of 60’s Free Speech Movement

by Marilyn Bechtel, People's World
BERKELEY, Calif. - Low wage workers - fast food, child and home care, security and more - were joined by dozens of area unions and community organizations Apr. 15 in a massive demonstration for $15 and a union. The action began with a rally at historic Sproul Plaza on the University of California, Berkeley campus, site of the famed Free Speech Movement in the mid-1960s.
berkeley-fightfor15-april152015.jpg
[Photo: Marilyn Bechtel/PW]


Participants came from actions all over the San Francisco Bay area earlier in the day, including San Jose and surrounding South Bay communities, San Francisco, and Marin County. Many of those actions targeted McDonald's outlets.

Mayor Ruth Atkins of neighboring Emeryville drew cheers from the rally crowd as she announced that on July 1, the city's minimum wage would rise to $14.42 an hour. Other area communities including Oakland, San Francisco and Berkeley, have raised or are in process to increase their minimum wages, while State Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, has introduced a bill to raise the state's minimum.

Speaking in English and Spanish, Mary Kay Henry, president of the Service Employees International Union, called the Berkeley action "the exclamation point" in the Fight for $15 and said her union was participating in over 200 cities around the country.

Along with statements of support, including Alameda Labor Council Executive Director Josie Camacho's pledge that the county's 100,000 union members stand solidly with the campaign, came calls to bring struggles together across traditional organizing lines.

Sheila Tully, president of the California Faculty Association at San Francisco State University, drew attention to a low-wage constituency not always recognized: part-time, adjunct college and university lecturers, many of whom she said earn less than $15 an hour.

"I earned my Masters and my Ph.D. at UC Berkeley," Tully said, "and I can barely make a living in San Francisco." Her union stands in solidarity with fast food and retail workers, and with all faculty members, she said. "We know when we stand together, fight together, we win."

A related message was brought by Devonte Jackson of the Black Lives Matter movement. "We're seeing that not only are black people being murdered by police on the street, but we're seeing state-sanctioned violence in the gentrification and displacement of our communities, in income inequality, inadequate public schools, and a less than 3 percent black student population on this campus."

Jackson urged "organizing at the intersections ... it's not enough to have a black lives matter movement separate from the economic justice movement, the Fight for $15 separate from the migrants movement and the environmental justice movement."

Immigration activist Maria Echaveste added: "You also need to know that this battle is across countries," noting that farm workers in the U.S. and in Mexico are oppressed by the same corporations.

Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune enlarged the circle further, pointing out that those worst hurt by corporate actions underlying climate change are those with the least resources. "One third of Americans live in places where it is unhealthy to breathe, every day," he said. "And the people who live in these places invariably are people being paid starvation wages. That's why the Sierra Club is part of the Fight for $15."

After the rally, over 1,000 protesters marched peacefully and energetically through downtown Berkeley, stopping at a downtown McDonald's, and temporarily snarling traffic.

A new study by the UC Berkeley Labor Center, The High Public Cost of Low Wages, points out that low wages are costing U.S. taxpayers nearly $153 billion annually in public support for working families.

Speaking on radio station KPFA's UpFront program April 15, lead author Ken Jacobs, the center's chair, said higher wages would mean the funds "could be used in a more targeted manner." He also noted that "some large companies, like McDonald's and Wal-Mart, "are effectively using these programs as a subsidy."

Jacobs said over half of fast food workers across the country are getting public assistance, as are nearly half of child care and home care workers, and even a quarter of part-time college faculty. Modest wage increases would cause a small rise in costs of goods and services, amounting to half of 1 percent overall, and less than 5 percent for restaurant meals, he said.

Specifically in California, Jacobs said, working families are receiving some $3.7 billion in public assistance, amounting to about half of total public assistance funds.
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by Labor Creates All Wealth
Why was this labor publicity stunt rally for a paltry $15 per hour at the rich folks' finishing school, the University of California, instead of at Oakland City Hall where there is a large plaza just outside in a very workingclass city?

Why does the People's World, mouthpiece of the Democratic Party club known as the Communist Party, promote higher wages for "security" also known as police? (You will see that statement in the first line listing the low wage workers.) The police are not workers. They are the armed mouthpieces of the capitalist class.

The labor show on KPFA is Workweek Radio hosted by Steve Zeltzer, not Upfront. Upfront is promoted by the pro-police (Margy Wilkinson, former Communist Party member and now a proud Democrat, actually stated sometimes police are necessary!), anti-KPFA "SaveKPFA" government mouthpieces intent on destroying the entire five-station Pacifica Radio Network, including KPFA. To learn the truth about the destruction of KPFA, see http://www.unitedforcommunityradio.org/ and sign up for the Emailed newsletter too. The latest article says it all:
http://www.unitedforcommunityradio.org/?p=2201

Steve Zeltzer is also part of Labor Video Project, which had an excellent article and video on this Fight for $15 per hour April 15 tax day rally at
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2015/04/16/18771198.php
with a good video at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwUYMeSGM5E&feature=youtu.be

Truth be told, $15 per hour is not enough to live on anywhere in the Bay Area. Many of these people have children, and therefore need a house. You need an income of at least $120,000 a year to buy a house, or $60 per hour. Another truth is the Democratic Party had a majority in the US House and Senate in 2009 with a Democratic president, and did not raise the federal minimum wage to anything anyone, much less a family, can live on. The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour! In California, the Democratic Party has had a supermajority in the Assembly and Senate for decades, and the governor has frequently been a Democrat, the latest sitting there since 2011. The California minimum wage is $9 per hour, also a starvation, homeless person's wage. In San Francisco, where the Democratic Party's election fraud machine has sat at City Hall since 1960, the latest "living wage" is $11.05 per hour for non-profits, $13.02 per hour for profit businesses, and some vacation. See http://sfgsa.org/Modules/ShowDocument.aspx?documentID=8323 In San Francisco, you are lucky to find a studio apartment for $1200 per month, and that requires a NET income (after taxes) of $4,800 per month or $57,600 per year or $30 per hour, and a family needs at least a one bedroom apartment, preferably two bedrooms, so this "living wage" is a lie.

The Free Speech Movement is long gone, 51 years ago, and had nothing to do with labor organizing. UC Berkeley is now the home of John Yoo, the torture memo writer now law professor. That typifies everything about UC Berkeley.

Publicity stunts, such as having labor rallies on tax day, April 15, just are not enough. We have heard about this Fight for $15 per hour, the latest Democratic Party publicity stunt, for a couple years now. Obviously, they are trying to build some support for their bankrupt party which just announced the candidacy of their favorite millionaire warmonger, Hillary Clinton, apparently to get the female vote. Considering her party has made life worse for the workingclass in this country in order to feed the war machine, this is a slap in the face to all women and to labor.

There has to be serious labor organizing everywhere. The union organizing restaurants has to hand out union cards at EVERY SINGLE RESTAURANT in San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley and beyond. When sufficient cards are signed, a union contract needs to be presented to the employer. Should the employer fail to sign, the workers must go on strike and shut down the business until a union contract is signed.

Until that happens, we can only ask, is 50% poverty not enough to move people in this country to organize the unorganized? Do you need 60%, 70%, 80% poverty? That is certainly coming, real soon. Now is the time to get off the dime.





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