BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) — On day four of the Kaiser Permanente health care worker strike, employees and the company aren’t any closer to reaching an agreement.

“The facts are that quality is not in dispute. Staffing is not in dispute. What’s in dispute are the wages. Plain and simple, we’ve offered a very fair agreement, a fair proposal, to our nurses and to our alliance represented unions,” said Camille Applin-Jones, Senior Vice President for Kaiser Permanente of Southern California.

Across California and Hawaii, 31,000 Kaiser employees have taken to the picket lines. Here in Bakersfield, dozens of employees are on the march outside Kaiser’s Stockdale Highway office.

“Kaiser wants to emphasize that it’s all about money, but that’s not the truth. The truth is that we want safe ratios. We want to be able to have their access for our patients, so they can get the care that they deserve and that we don’t require moral injury at the end of shifts and feeling like we weren’t able to provide the care that we want to for our patients,” said Jennifer Aleman Ocampo, a physician’s assistant at Kaiser.

“It’s more than just wages, because this is a calling for us. This is what we do. This is what we enjoy doing. We would rather be in the clinic, in the hospital setting, taking care of patients,” said Jorge Ortiz, a charge nurse for Kaiser.

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Kaiser Executives disagreed.

Senior Vice President for Kaiser’s Southern California operations said Kaiser has already proposed a substantial raise.

“The offer that’s currently on the table is 21.5% over four years. What that means for the average nurse is that in the first two years, they’ll receive a 16% increase that is not just fair wages, but those are highly competitive wages and industry leading. At the end of the four year contract, they will have received the 21.5%,” Applin-Jones said.

That’s not just a raise, it’s a career-changing benefit, says Applin-Jones.

“Some nurses will receive upwards of 30% increase in their total salary, and what that looks like in real life or real people, would be a difference in $161,000 on average of annual pay, compared to $211,000 by the end of the four year contract…staggering,” Applin-Jones added.

With no agreement yet, there’s no end it sight for the Kaiser worker’s strike.

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