Commentary
Strikes are only as strong as our solidarity

From the Minneapolis Labor Review, October 25, 2019

By Chelsie Glaubitz Gabiou, President,
Minneapolis Regional Labor Federation

Strike!

One of the most powerful, impactful actions that workers organized together can take is to withhold their labor. There’s been a significant uptick of strike activity throughout our region over the past year.

While all the news media outlets say the economy is strong and we are at full-employment, workers on the ground know that low unemployment numbers don’t tell the whole story.

Wages are stagnant, healthcare costs continue to climb, we’re taking on multiple jobs, and rents are continuing to skyrocket.

When workers go on strike, our job begins: to support these striking workers and their families in every way possible. They need our financial support, our moral support and our community support.

At the end of the week there is less money left in our checking accounts and fewer hours in the day to spend with our families. This real anxiety that workers are facing is one of the reasons we are seeing the marked increase of activity on strike lines.

Minnesota nurses have staged massive walk-outs on some of the most prominent healthcare companies in our state, fighting for their very own access to healthcare.

UAW workers across the country went on strike to protect their jobs and to stand against the outsourcing of their work.

USW workers at Carley Foundry in Blaine are bracing for a strike over wages and reductions in earned vacation time.

And brave Amazon workers in Shakopee, who don’t even have the protection of a union contract, carried out a strike earlier this year over the appalling workplace conditions at the fulfillment center.

No strike is easy, especially for the workers who are forgoing pay for an undetermined amount of time. The amount of sacrifice required by the individual for the greater good of all workers is profound. But this individual sacrifice is what continues to build the labor movement for everybody.

When workers go on strike, our job begins: to support these striking workers and their families in every way possible. They need our financial support, our moral support and our community support.

Strikes are only as strong as our solidarity. As more strike activity looms on the horizon, please plan now to commit the time, energy and resources to any and all strike efforts in our movement.

Contact MRLF president Chelsie Glaubitz Gabiou at 612-321-5670 or chelsie@minneapolisunions.org.