Workers across the country are joining picket lines to secure higher wages, affordable healthcare, and better working conditions at a rate that might outpace last year’s explosion of strike activity. In 2021, the wave of workers who walked off the job in October inspired the term ‘Striketober,’ and since then strike activity has grown.
Since the start of 2022, there have been more than 280 strikes or protests—up from 158 during the same period in 2021, according to Cornell University’s Labor Action Tracker. Strike activity is cutting through industries and geography. In October alone, 15,000 nurses throughout Minnesota, 6,000 educators in Seattle, 4,500 teachers in Columbus, Ohio, 1,000 food workers in San Francisco, and over 1,000 mill workers in Lebanon, Oregon were among the workers who went on strike.