Dear members: 

While UChicago stalled, we organized, rallied, and made our demands clear over the past two months. On Friday our Bargaining Committee finally received the University’s first set of economic counter-offers. 

The University proposed: 

• A $40,000/year minimum stipend, beginning in 2024-2025. They nixed our backpay proposal of $45,000 minimum for the 2023-2024 academic year.

• Only 2% annual raises for those who make more than 40k already – effectively, a pay cut for a majority of PhD workers!

• No cost-of-living-adjustments. Seriously? Inflation was at 8% just last year! 

• $17/hour minimum pay rates for hourly workers, no change to the status quo. Yikes!

• A whopping extra $500 to the current $2000 child care stipend for grad parents that hasn’t increased since 2011. That’s insulting. Our proposal for $5,500/year for one, $7,500 for two and $9,500 for three or more dependents is in line with what’s offered at peer institutions.

Does this represent a “real effort” to meet graduate workers’ needs? No! We first voted to unionize in 2017, and UChicago blocked us with cynical legal gymnastics. We should be bargaining our second or third union contract now; so we’re going to fight for wages that reflect what grad workers should be earning!

We reject a status quo of precarity for graduate workers. The only way that each and every member – YOU – will get the pay and benefits YOU DESERVE is if you and your co-workers take action to settle this contract. 

RSVP to a meeting in your division to escalate our campaign for a living wage, a discrimination-free workplace and dental and vision!

UChicago only works because – and if – we do.

In solidarity,

Your Bargaining Committee