On January 25, 2011, tens of thousands of Egyptians took to the streets calling for “Change, Equality, and Social Justice.” Initially, protesters raised both economic and political grievances. Economic demands included an increase in the minimum wage, as well as combating poverty and unemployment. Political demands included an end to the state of emergency, and the removal of the minister of interior. Less than a week later, protesters seemed to have converged on a single demand, namely the departure of President Hosni Mubarak. Paradoxically, economic demands raised at the onset of the protests almost entirely disappeared, even as social classes with entrenched economic grievances increasingly outnumbered the young middle classes responsible for initial mobilization. Even more surprising, Egypt’s independent labor movement, which had become particularly active in pushing for higher wages over the last six years, only formally joined the protests after they had converged over a seemingly controversial goal for this constituency, namely ousting Mubarak. Over the last six years, Egypt had witnessed an unprecedented increase in the number (and intensity) of low-level protests, involving not only the traditionally active blue-collar workers, but also white-collar state employees. For the most part, these protests revolved around localized economic demands, though they have occasionally pushed for politically ambitious goals, such as the legalization of independent unions. Although the labor movement greatly contributed to the spread of a protest culture in Egypt, it refrained from endorsing an anti-regime posture that might jeopardize its core interests. This paper will trace the evolution of discourses and slogans raised over the course of the January 2011 uprising. In doing so, it will reveal a disjuncture between the interests and discourses adopted by an increasingly diverse popular movement. Two explanations will be addressed. The first has to do with the institutional barriers to independent mobilization of the labor movement. The second has to do with the fact that the leaders of Egypt’s independent labor movement mobilized their bases when it became clear to them that they can no longer place their bets on the survival of the regime. The analysis will pay close attention to geographic variation in protest discourse and to the impact of the nature of the various groups involved on the timing of their mobilization. It will draw on interviews with local scholars and labor activists, and on the extensive local press coverage of the period under study.