Chile’s Students and Workers Rally Against Kast’s Budget Squeeze
Thousands of students, teachers, public employees and social organizations marched through Santiago on October 1 against feared cuts to education and other public services as President José Antonio Kast’s 2027 budget heads to Congress. Police used water cannons and tear gas during the demonstration, while protesters argued that the government’s fiscal priorities would push the burden of adjustment onto students and workers.
The Confederation of Chilean Students, CONFECH, called the mobilization under the demand “Not a single peso less for education.” Police put turnout in Santiago at roughly 6,000, while organizers said more than 20,000 participated. Marches also took place in Valparaíso, and teachers, workers and other social organizations joined the student-led action.
At least 17 people were detained in Santiago. Organizers said most of the march was peaceful and criticized the police operation, while footage from the capital showed water cannons, tear gas and arrests after clashes broke out along the route.
The mobilization also lands in a country where organized labor is already contesting who pays for economic adjustment. Pamphlets recently covered Escondida workers’ 95% strike vote over the distribution of copper wealth, another fight over wages, public resources and the balance of power between workers and capital.
Kast’s government says the budget is not an attack on education. The proposal allocates 17.3 trillion Chilean pesos to the sector and raises total public spending by 1.5 percent compared with 2026. Officials say the plan would fund schooling for more than 3.5 million students, maintain meal programs for 1.8 million children and preserve free higher education for more than 600,000 students.
The argument is over what those headline numbers mean after inflation, existing shortfalls and competing demands across the public sector. Student and teacher organizations say the projected funding will not meet the system’s needs. El País reported that the overall 1.5 percent spending increase is the smallest in two decades apart from the post-pandemic decline in 2022, as Chile also faces unemployment of about 9.6 percent.
That broader economic pressure is why the march expanded beyond university politics. Participants framed the fight around education together with employment, health and the conditions facing the working class. Professors and public-sector workers marched alongside students rather than treating the budget as a narrow campus dispute.
The confrontation now moves to Congress, where the 2027 budget will be debated. For Kast, the dispute tests whether a government elected on a sharp rightward turn can impose a tighter fiscal program without provoking a wider social coalition. For the demonstrators, the immediate demand is simpler: public education and social services should not be the place where the state balances its books.
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