This paper examines the economic impact of the 1979 labor strike against lettuce producer-shippers in the Imperial Valley of California. The theory presented suggests that formidable problems are encountered by agricultural labor unions in obtaining higher wages for farm workers. During the 1979 strike, ironically the returns to many of the lettuce producers in the Imperial Valley increased substantially.
There is no right to strike against the public safety by anybody, anywhere, any time.
Although recourse must always be had first to a sincere dialogue between the parties, a strike, nevertheless, can remain even in present-day circumstances a necessary, though ultimate, aid for the defense of the workers' own rights and the fulfillment of their just desires.
Strike against war, for without you no battles can be fought. Strike against manufacturing shrapnel and gas bombs and all other tools of murder. Strike against preparedness that means death and misery to millions of human beings. Be not dumb, obedient slaves in an army of destruction. Be heroes in an army of construction.
A former rector of San Marcos, the oldest university of the Americas, declared to me more than ten years ago that he had resigned his exalted office because either the students or the professors were on strike. Regular teaching had become well-nigh impossible.
I am glad to know that there is a system of labor where the laborer can strike if he wants to! I would to God that such a system prevailed all over the world.
Although the union leadership may recognize early in negotiations that the firm cannot or will not meet the workers' demands, the rank and file of the union often do not understand the impracticability of their position until after the workers have struck and the firm fails to surrender.
Strikes, boycott, parliamentarism, meetings and demonstrations are all good forms of struggle as means for preparing and organising the proletariat. But not one of these means is capable of abolishing existing inequality. All these means must be concentrated in one principal and decisive means; the proletariat must rise and launch a determined attack upon the bourgeoisie in order to destroy capitalism to its foundations. This principal and decisive means is the socialist revolution.