Princeton University boasts a multitude of resources, funds, and support systems that it advertises to the student body, faculty and staff, and wider community at large. Princeton’s service employees, in particular, see a variety of exceptional benefits. Yet, despite Princeton's enormous wealth and promises of opportunities, service workers' wages have fallen below the cost of living; wage raises have not matched the rise of healthcare costs and general inflation over recent years, with base raises ranging between 2.7 and 4.65%. For the last few years, service workers have had difficulties affording groceries and essential items, which falls short of the University’s promise to employees that their working conditions are improving.

Union contract negotiations are scheduled to take place in 2024, which provides a new opportunity for workers and the University to come to a new, fairer agreement for the following several years. This provides an opportunity for the University to correct its mistakes, and to ensure decent improvements to working conditions over time.

For the 2024 negotiations, Princeton YDSA, co-signing organizations, and the undersigned, in line with concerns expressed by Princeton service employees, support the following demands for the coming contract negotiations between members of Service Employees International Union Local 175 and Princeton University Human Resources and the Princeton administration.

• Make bundled time off and holidays productive time

• Grant more benefits to retirees, including My Health Coach, which would offset costs for diabetes and other medications.

• Offset transportation and parking costs, and contribute to resilient infrastructure to slow and withstand climate change.
  

• A living minimum wage and automatic, annual cost-of-living adjustments (COLA) that meet or exceed USD inflation as reported by the Consumer Price Index and the cost of benefits as a baseline, while maintaining and expanding additional performance raises.

• Back pay for the past five years, during which raises trailed cost of living.

• Provide opportunities for workers to receive higher pay in exchange for taking on additional responsibilities not in their base job description.

• Reinstate double time pay for the 7th consecutive day of work.

• Reinstate workers' right to strike to allow them to fully utilize their constitutional right to free expression for the betterment of their families, the student body, and the Princeton community.

• Update job descriptions to reflect the full duties of each position.

• Provide affordable childcare so that parents are not burdened for ensuring the safety and care of their children.

• Restore previously guaranteed family vacation benefits and opportunities.

• Provide free memberships for on-campus gyms.

YDSA heard from 116 service workers on campus about their concerns regarding workplace conditions. Among the responses we gathered from service employees–across the political spectrum from left to right to apolitical–we found several common themes and expressions about their employment with the University:

“I can’t buy clothes or anything that isn’t essential, it’s honestly extremely depressing….”
“I feel if I was gone tomorrow nobody would even care.”
“I am proud of my work but I don’t feel like the [University] is proud to have us.”
“I just want to be treated like I mean something to [P]rinceton”
“[My] union does not reserve the right to strike and that is the only powerful tool for any union to express it[s] voice.”
“I have problems paying my bills and paying for food and I don't feel like [I’m] important to the university even though I work hard”
“Most months I’m overdrafting my account just to survive.”
“It could be better if we ha[d] an option to strike because we are way under pay.”
“Pay doesn’t reflect the cost of living.”
“[E]verything is going up but my salary!”

In response to being directly queried on salaries being presently insufficient to support the cost of living, President Eisgruber and Vice President of Human Resources Romy Riddick admitted in a CPUC meeting on February 20th of this year that the University pays “very close attention” to market conditions in making adjustments to salaries, rather than employee needs or cost of living.

Among those we heard from, 93% of employees said that annual wage adjustments equal to or greater than the increase in cost of living should be the minimum for service employees at Princeton.

At Princeton, a topic of great interest is the importance of the right of free expression. This power has been freely wielded by groups on campus to debate the rights and existences of its most vulnerable members. Apparently, however, this right does not extend to service workers and their ability to protest for their right to be paid a wage that they can survive on, to be compensated for exceptional work, to enjoy meaningful and accessible benefits, and to work in a safe environment. Princeton’s no-strike clause silences that right. We believe in the right to strike as a last resort to improve terms for both workers and students at Princeton in the long run.

As a result of the deteriorating conditions for employees at the University, many feel increasingly excluded from the University community. As a university community, we support the above improvements for service employees at Princeton. 

Signed,

Princeton Young Democratic Socialists of America
Central New Jersey Democratic Socialists of America
Divest Princeton
New York University Young Democratic Socialists of America
Our Revolution Trenton-Mercer
Pride Princeton
Princeton Alliance of Jewish Progressives
Princeton College Democrats
Princeton Graduate Students United Organizing Committee
Princeton Latin American Student Association
Princeton Muslim Advocates for Social Justice and Individual Dignity
Princeton Progressives
Princeton South Asian Progressive Alliance
Princeton Students for Justice in Palestine
Princeton Students for Prison Education, Abolition, and Reform
Princeton University Postdocs and Scholars
Resistencia en Acción NJ
Rowan Progressives
Starbucks Workers United NJ
Students for Prison Education, Abolition, and Reform
Sunrise Princeton
The Princeton Progressive

Vera S Candiani, Faculty
Zahid Chaudhary, Faculty
Marc Ratkovic, Faculty
Sarah Chihaya, Faculty
Satyel Larson, Faculty
Ruha Benjamin, Faculty
Barbara Nagel, Faculty
Eldar Shafir, Faculty
Jared Abbott, Faculty
Spyros Papapetros, Faculty
Ilyana Kuziemko, Faculty
Bryan Lowe, Faculty
Ellora Derenoncourt, Faculty
Rachel Price, Faculty
Jane Cox, Faculty
Alberto Bruzos, Faculty
Anastasia Mann, Faculty
Dan-el Padilla Peralta, Faculty
Kathryn Edin, Faculty
Miguel A Centeno, Faculty
Betsy Levy Paluck, Faculty
Christiane Fellbaum, Faculty
Tessa Lowinske Desmond, Faculty
Andrea L. Graham, Faculty
Josie Ziluca, Faculty
Gillian Knapp, Emeritus faculty
Ra'anan Boustan, Research Scholar
Ahmed Shalabi, Visiting scholar
Robert Hawkins, Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Paola Estrada, Postdoc
Judy Kim, Postdoc
Mauro Orsini Windholz, Graduate student
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Aleksandar Kostić, Graduate student
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Timothy Alberdingk Thijm, Graduate student
Holly Bushman, Graduate student
Chenchen Yan, Graduate student
Maxwell Smith-Holmes, Graduate student
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Cassie Eng, Undergraduate student
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Frida Ruiz, Undergraduate student
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Nate Howard, Undergraduate student
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Katie Rohrbaugh, Undergraduate student
Liam Seeley, Undergraduate student
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Laura Sandoval Vergara, Undergraduate student
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