CLASS STRUGGLES. At The Corner, student protests of proposed fee increases at California's flagship state universities are advocacy of a regressive transfer.

First and foremost, the protests are about privileged kids demanding subsidies from working people. The UC system will continue to be heavily subsidized by taxpayers, and the students who attend are among the most naturally gifted, with the highest future earning potential, in the country. This is especially true at the system's flagship schools of Berkeley and UCLA, where the protests have been most intense. Narcissism and self-absorption are the norm on college campuses, but it really is pushing the limits to throw such a tantrum at the idea that you will be getting a smaller amount of free money taken out of the paychecks of strapped taxpayers, most of whom could never dream of the advantages and opportunities you enjoy.

At the World Socialist Web Site, privilege begins somewhere else.

UCLA Political Science Professor Mark Sawyer told the press that he was teaching his course when shouts of “Walkout! Walkout!” became audible in the classroom. His students stood up and left in response, with Sawyer joining them.

“I have single moms in that class [and] students supporting parents. I have people who have children and they are scraping together what they can to try to support themselves and their education,” Sawyer said.

The hardship is one that other Californians probably also bear.

Many students in the UC system hold part-time and even full-time jobs in order to support themselves while attending college. The fee hikes will make it impossible for them to continue going to school. It was reported on Friday that California’s unemployment rate has inched up again, and is now at 12.3 percent.

Once upon a time, working one's way through college was an honorable calling, and the community colleges and night programs offered their students comparable intellectual challenges to those offered at the tonier institutions. It's a strange sort of recession in which working one's way is now one of the evils of capitalism.