WAGE SCALE BARGAINING

Whether we're UC-UAW workers with a union contract or unrepresented workers still seeking a voice on the job, we share a common goal: building a UC where workers can afford to stay, grow their careers, and continue serving our students, programs, and communities. 

When 12,000 UAW-represented staff negotiated their first contract in 2025-2026, UC management agreed to establish a step-based wage scale for professional staff in UAW-represented titles by July 2027. Those negotiations will begin in January 2027.

If more professional staff come together and join our coworkers in UAW before bargaining starts in January 2027, we all gain the power necessary to improve conditions across the university. 

To help prepare for wage scale bargaining, staff across UC, whether or not they are currently represented by a union, are taking this survey. Please take the survey to make your voice heard!

Take the Wage Scale Survey

We share the same challenges:

  • Rising cost of living

  • Limited advancement opportunities

  • Inconsistent pay growth

  • Staffing shortages

  • Growing workloads

These issues are not isolated to one title or department. UC's research, education, health, and public service missions depend on staff who stay and build careers here. Yet many of us are forced to leave because management fails to provide adequate wage growth, fair advancement opportunities, and long-term career paths. The fight for fair career progression belongs to every worker at UC. 

We need a pay scale that creates transparency, fairness, and stability. It should reward experience, recognize growth, and help retain the workers who make UC run. Workers should not have to negotiate individually or depend on management discretion to receive fair wage increases. A step-based wage system ensures equitable, transparent pay progression and recognition for our experience. 

UC management has a clear choice in front of them: Invest in the workers who make its mission possible, or continue a system that fuels turnover, understaffing, and instability. We’re organizing to push them toward the right choice.