October 15th General Strike (Script & Sources)

Good morning, good news! It’s about time for a general strike, and you’re probably hearing a lot about one scheduled for October 15th, 2021. Now, if you’re a billionaire or politician, you may be thinking, “Come on, everything’s great now! We gave you guys $1,400 bucks six months ago, what’s the problem?” Let’s take a minute to explain exactly what the problem is, and what to expect from a general strike.

Today, wages are at an all-time low, while the costs of food, housing, healthcare, childcare and transportation are at an all-time high. We’re just coming off of a devastating pandemic in which the owner class of billionaires and millionaire politicians did next-to-nothing to protect us while siphoning trillions of dollars of our tax money to prop up a stock market that they own almost all of. We watched the wealthy willingly sacrifice thousands of so-called essential workers, so that businesses could keep generating income, almost none of which went to paying those essential workers. 1-in-3 Americans lost their jobs or took a pay cut, 1-in-7 still can’t make rent and face eviction or foreclosure, and at the peak of the pandemic the poverty rate almost doubled from 10.5% to 17.3%. And while workers lost $1.3 trillion dollars in income during the pandemic billionaires added exactly $1.3 trillion dollars to their net worths, and now they’re competing over who gets to go play horsey in space.

So, in the aftermath of an economic collapse that has unambiguously showed the urgent need for a higher minimum wage, universal healthcare, student debt relief, and impactful action on climate change — we’re seeing that we’re definitely not getting a higher minimum wage, universal healthcare, student debt relief, or impactful action on climate change. At least, not enough of those things to make a real difference, especially after record turnout during a global pandemic to vote in a different political party, only to be told that they can’t do anything because of one guy from West Virginia.

So it probably comes as no surprise that everyone who can’t afford to just blast off into outer space is BIG mad, and the idea of not coming into work or buying anything, and telling our bosses, politicians, and the billionaires who rely on exploiting our labor and stealing our wages to just fuck themselves — feels like it might be the right move for a lot of the working class. And that’s what a general strike is.

So, how does that help us? Also known as a class strike, a general strike is a mass refusal to work, usually paired with a boycott of economic activity, and sometimes social protest.

The number one thing business owners rely on is available labor, and almost all industries require a steady supply of labor, or they’re liable to collapse. So when the owner class is faced with choosing between the collapse of their future income, versus making reasonable, long overdue concessions, they’ll sometimes give workers what they want. That is, after exhausting all of their political, social, and economic power — which can include police or military violence.

But historically in the United States, general strikes have brought about real change. In fact, the reason we have unions at all is because in 1934, there was a huge wave of general strikes across the country, starting with an 83-day long industry strike along the West Coast in which two strikers were killed by police. That prompted a general strike in San Francisco where 150,000 workers stopped working for 4 days. And…it worked! Not only was the West Coast strike settled, but soon after, it inspired an even larger strike on the other side of the country, involving 400,000 textile workers across New England, the Mid-Atlantic, and Southern states.

The textile workers’ strike was the largest in US history and lasted for 22 days, but they weren’t as lucky as the workers in San Francisco. A state of emergency was declared, and some states called in the National Guard. In Georgia, the governor (who by the way was literally an open white supremacist) had picketers arrested and interred in a WWI prisoner of war camp. At least a dozen people were killed, and in the end, the strike fell apart, no real concessions were made, and thousands of strikers permanently lost their jobs.

Still, the following year, the National Labor Relations Act of 1935, or Wagner Act, was signed into law — which allows for private workers to form unions, engage in collective bargaining, and take collective action, like strikes.

So, what’s actually going on with the general strike on October 15th? Well, according to the website “octoberstrike.com”, the directions are simple: starting on the day of the strike, abstain from going into work, don’t participate in economic activity, and contact your local representatives to express these six demands: a 25% corporate tax rate, free healthcare for all, 12 weeks paid parental leave, a $20 minimum wage, a 4 day work week, and strict environmental regulations on corporations.

Now, here are a few things to keep in mind. As of right now, this strike has no organizational or union backing, it’s just a website and a bunch of social media pages, that all seem to be run by different people. But it’s also important to note that that doesn’t matter — it doesn’t need a clear organization for it to work. It’s also worth noting that the current demands and structure of the strike are not set in stone, and if it gains momentum and participants, there may be a different set of demands by October based on what most people want.

But the basic idea of a general strike is not an unexpected historical development considering what the entire working class has been through in the last year, and really, in the last 40 years. The top 1% has siphoned more than 50 trillion dollars from the bottom 90% since 1975, and to anyone who is paying attention, it looks like the effects of that are rapidly catching up to us. So, what happens next?