Strikes, big and small, increased 50% nationwide last year

But work stoppages remain well below labor’s high-water marks

Workers engaged in 417 strikes in 2022, a year-over-year increase of more than 50 percent, with the number of workers participating in work stoppages rising 60 percent compared with 2021, researchers at Cornell’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations detailed in a report. 

The 144 work stoppages by workers in the accommodation and food services trades, the vast majority involving either Starbucks workers or those organizing with the national Fight for $15 campaign, accounted for about one-third of strikes, more any other industry. But those stoppages involved just 7,000 workers, or about 3 percent of the total who struck last year, the researchers found.