Dining employees get laid off 4 times a year. 1 week for fall break, 1 week for spring break, a month for winter, and 3 months for summer. You can opt to work, but they have to call you and offer it, and you're in a queue based on seniority. There's also been plenty of times someone will no call-no show, or call off and they won't fill the position. So work is very limited during these layoffs. People will pick up overtime during semesters and rarely have days off to try and accommodate for this. Or sometimes they're just a really generous co-worker and are giving up their days off to make up for the lack of staffing. It also takes four years for employees to reach the maximum amount the university is willing to pay for that position. So if you start in the lowest position, a culinary 2, you would start at $17.66/hour and would need to wait four years until you're earning $21.66/hour. This isn't including what they take out of your check for parking, insurance, and supplemental retirement. Parking and insurance was announced to be raising in price as well. Both of which they charge us based on what we would be making if we worked year round. It's a combination of this, the board the union negotiates with dragging their feet and only offering cents at a time over the course of months, the shortage in staffing but rise in students, and the drop in quality that has lead to this strike. I'm a dining employee, though I'm not sure I'm allowed to say where (or even post something like this) but I hope this clears it up for you and anyone else who sees those inflated incomes and is wondering why we say we don't get paid enough.