5 ms·

There's like five comments with this "huge salaries for administrators" theme. Is that some political party's talking point? Did it feature in some Netflix hit?

There's like five comments with this "huge salaries for administrators" theme. Is that some political party's talking point? Did it feature in some Netflix hit? Because I can't quite see how it's an actual factor? If we're talking deans and university presidents, the numbers are just too low to make a difference for universities with tens of thousands of students. Plus, obviously, some Dean of Harvard Law might be earning millions but would still be underpaid relative to what they could command in the private sector. If it's "administrators" as in "lowly" bureaucrats, how do they have the power to be given salaries beyond what's needed to attract them in the marketplace? If we compare their relative level of education with your average San Francisco Javascript coder, are their salaries still too high? Speaking of COBOL: University IT staff, which would seem to be among the categories of "administration", is almost stereotypically underpaid compared to the private sector. Staying within the PhD comics universe, graduate students, postdocs, and other non-tenured faculty often have to fudge the numbers to delude themselves into believing they make more than minimum wage. This would also seem to disprove any theory that universities are particularly generous or incompetent when it comes to labor exploitation. Beyond that, it seems strange how you are linking these two issues, of administrative salaries and foreign students. There is absolutely no reason to believe that money coming in via these students is different in any way to, say, grants or patent royalties or donations from alumni or really any source of income. Foreign students pay more than their relative share of costs. Thus, they lower costs for everyone else. They take nobody's spot, but allow for more (subsidised) US students to attend. This holds as long as an additional $1,000 made from foreign students does not, on average, result in admin salaries rising >$1,000. That would seem to be a pretty safe assumption, and I doubt anyone can come up with a plausible mechanism for why it should not be the case. It really seems to me like you have two rather specific grievances, the choice of which I can't really explain except that I have a tingling sense they might have distant roots within the same corner of the ideological spectrum. And because these are your associations when the topic of universities comes up, or because you believe it helps to validate each, you've drawn some connection between the two. But since neither is particularly well-tethered in reality, they really don't have much support to offer each other.

ggggtez 6y ago
You wrote a lot of text, but I think you are speaking from a position of ignorance or emotion, to be honest, on the topic of high salaries. You seem to be arguing that it's impossible for anyone to be paid too much, because of the simple existence of the free market system. But that way of thinking completely ignores the outcomes of that tuition spent. If other countries produce graduates that are the same or better, for less tuition, then you should be looking at that as a flaw in our system. That means the free market is not working efficiently, and more competition in the sector would drive prices down without loss of quality. As for the questions about international students, I decline to comment, as I agree it's specious.
- IfOnlyYouKnew 6y ago
  > You seem to be arguing that it's impossible for anyone to be paid too much, because of the simple existence of the free market system. That's sort of the definition of a salary subject to market forces, yes. But, as an alternative, I even suggested comparing administrators' salaries with education-matched employees in IT startups. You're not offering any specific alternative, but OP's comment and yours seem to basically amount to "I know what people should earn, and 'administration' is useless anyway." > If other countries produce graduates that are the same or better, for less tuition, then you should be looking at that as a flaw in our system. Many countries produce many things cheaper than the US, often at the same quality. Foodstuffs are an obvious example, but there are many more: a pilot in China or South Africa earns far less than an American, even though they are trained to the same standard. Does this mean US pilots are overpaid? Taxi drivers the world over provide pretty much equal service, but does that mean US taxi drivers should earn $1.20/day (average Iraqi daily income for taxis)? But even assuming US universities are too expensive, which I would tend to agree with, I was specifically challenging the idea that high salaries are as dominant a part of the explanation as the relative number of comments here focussing on it suggests. And because "administrators" was and remains ill-defined, I offered specific reasons why that is unlikely for a number of groups that people might be referring to. While you've devoted a paragraph to reading the emotional subtext of my comment, you neglected my rather plain request to be a bit more specific: by "administrator", are you referring to the Dean of the Law School, the Quinnipiac Polling Call Center Temp, the Executive Assistant to the Greenkeeper, the Physics Postdoc,...? Anyway, here's four alternative explanations that make more sense, IMO: - US universities spend more on research, and use tuition money to (partially) fund these activities. - US undergrad programs spent far more on student life, such as luxurious dormitories or sports centres - US tuition includes medical care, doesn't it? US medical care is famously inefficient. - US universities, even public ones, rely far more on tuition than universities in other countries, that get comparably higher government subsidies

ggggtez 6y ago

You wrote a lot of text, but I think you are speaking from a position of ignorance or emotion, to be honest, on the topic of high salaries. You seem to be arguing that it's impossible for anyone to be paid too much, because of the simple existence of the free market system. But that way of thinking completely ignores the outcomes of that tuition spent. If other countries produce graduates that are the same or better, for less tuition, then you should be looking at that as a flaw in our system. That means the free market is not working efficiently, and more competition in the sector would drive prices down without loss of quality. As for the questions about international students, I decline to comment, as I agree it's specious.

IfOnlyYouKnew 6y ago
> You seem to be arguing that it's impossible for anyone to be paid too much, because of the simple existence of the free market system. That's sort of the definition of a salary subject to market forces, yes. But, as an alternative, I even suggested comparing administrators' salaries with education-matched employees in IT startups. You're not offering any specific alternative, but OP's comment and yours seem to basically amount to "I know what people should earn, and 'administration' is useless anyway." > If other countries produce graduates that are the same or better, for less tuition, then you should be looking at that as a flaw in our system. Many countries produce many things cheaper than the US, often at the same quality. Foodstuffs are an obvious example, but there are many more: a pilot in China or South Africa earns far less than an American, even though they are trained to the same standard. Does this mean US pilots are overpaid? Taxi drivers the world over provide pretty much equal service, but does that mean US taxi drivers should earn $1.20/day (average Iraqi daily income for taxis)? But even assuming US universities are too expensive, which I would tend to agree with, I was specifically challenging the idea that high salaries are as dominant a part of the explanation as the relative number of comments here focussing on it suggests. And because "administrators" was and remains ill-defined, I offered specific reasons why that is unlikely for a number of groups that people might be referring to. While you've devoted a paragraph to reading the emotional subtext of my comment, you neglected my rather plain request to be a bit more specific: by "administrator", are you referring to the Dean of the Law School, the Quinnipiac Polling Call Center Temp, the Executive Assistant to the Greenkeeper, the Physics Postdoc,...? Anyway, here's four alternative explanations that make more sense, IMO: - US universities spend more on research, and use tuition money to (partially) fund these activities. - US undergrad programs spent far more on student life, such as luxurious dormitories or sports centres - US tuition includes medical care, doesn't it? US medical care is famously inefficient. - US universities, even public ones, rely far more on tuition than universities in other countries, that get comparably higher government subsidies