Strikes during the COVID-19 pandemic

"In the face of the COVID-19 tsunami, our lives are changing in ways that were inconceivable just a few short weeks ago. Not since the 2008–9 economic collapse has the world collectively shared an experience of this kind: a single, rapidly mutating global crisis, structuring the rhythm of our daily lives within a complex calculus of risk and competing probabilities. In response, numerous social movements have put forward demands that take seriously the potentially disastrous consequences of the virus, while also tackling the incapacity of capitalist governments to adequately address the crisis itself. These demands include questions of worker safety, the necessity of neighborhood-level organizing, and social security, the rights of those on s or in precarious employment, and the need to protect renters and those living in poverty."

"Across the United States, we are seeing workers walk off the job in wildcat strikes in response to the employers' failure either to shut down the workplace or to make it safe. The strikes are too few to call them a strike wave, but we should be aware that on their own initiative workers are taking what practically is the most powerful action they can: withdrawing their labour. The strikes are taking place in both the private and , in both unionised and non-union s large and small."

"For 150 years, workers have struck over safety and health in myriad industries, most memorably in the twentieth century the miners' strike over black lung. But we have not seen anything exactly like this before – wildcat strikes over health and safety in response to an epidemic, with workers making strong demands on the employers and sometimes winning. And these strikes are taking place in the midst of politicians' ignorant and sometimes deceitful statements and government failures at all levels. Consequently, these strikes – even when only directed at a particular employer – have not only an economic but also a political character. We're now seeing such strikes in a variety of industries in several states."

"Surely there must be other such strikes and sit-ins that haven't been covered by the press, and we know there are many other protests by all sorts of workers, particularly important among them teachers and nurses, though we do not include those in this discussion, important as they are. The wildcat strike holds a particular place in the history and theory of the labour movement, as well as today reaction to the bosses and the government during the coronavirus pandemic. We notice that these strikes involve both highly skilled and highly paid workers – such as those at the ' Bath shipyard – and also lower paid workers such as those at the Purdue chicken processing plant in Georgia and the bar and restaurant in Portland, Oregon. One can make the case that black workers – Pittsburgh sanitation, Kathleen, Georgia, Purdue chick, and Memphis Teamsters – play a leading role in the strikes. Yet workers at Bath shipyard are overwhelmingly white, while autoworkers are black, Arab, white and Latino, and GE's Lynn jet engine plant also has a racially mixed workforce. No doubt workers of all genders can be found in these protest, and we hear both men and women giving voice to the workers' concerns. While the central demands are about workers' health, we can see that already they begin to raise demands about wages, benefits and working conditions, as well as job security."

"Of course, the top priority now is to put public health and safety first. To that end, employees across the country are now thinking about refusing to obey orders to work in unsafe job conditions. U.S. capitalism has thus placed a general strike on today's social agenda. A close second priority is to learn from capitalism's failure in the face of the pandemic. We must not suffer such a dangerous and unnecessary social breakdown again. Thus system change is now also moving onto today's social agenda."