6 ms·

But it is a business. We are not talking about a YouTube channel of lecturers, we are talking about an organization with 2.7 billion dollars of annual revenue.

JKCalhoun 4y ago
Businesses have public relations. This is a bad look.
- throwawaysleep 4y ago
  Given the high cost of tuition, are people really going to want to pay grad students higher salaries? A lot of nice things in life require that someone make a low wage so they are affordable to you.
  - JKCalhoun 4y ago
    Yes, I think that tuitions need to come down as well.
  - komali2 4y ago
    Require? Genuinely require? It seems to me the high cost comes from attempting to create profit margin. If the profit is basically eliminated, the person can have the high wage, and we can have the nice things.
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      > If the profit is basically eliminated, the person can have the high wage, and we can have the nice things. Somehow, however, such Marxist implementations never deliver those nice things.
      - komali2 4y ago
        Co-ops are Marxist? If so, wow, Marxist businesses are remarkably profitable, productive [1], and resilient [2]! [1] https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/worker-cooperatives-are-more-productive-than-normal-companies/ https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/worker-cooperative... [2] https://www.uk.coop/sites/default/files/2020-10/co-operative_survival_1.pdf https://www.uk.coop/sites/default/files/2020-10/co-operative...
        WalterBright 4y ago
        If they are so remarkably profitable, why aren't they pervasive?
        komali2 4y ago
        Aren't they? The top 300 cooperatives apparently accounted for 2.2 trillion in turnover back in 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20171022081215/http://monitor.coop/ https://web.archive.org/web/20171022081215/http://monitor.co...
        WalterBright 4y ago
        So go set one up, then! And btw, none of the text in your cite says anything about 2.2 trillion in turnover.
        komali2 4y ago
        Thanks, I'll need to update the link on wikipedia later, it was correct last week. I have set up a co-op. It's going quite well.
        WalterBright 4y ago
        Good luck with your co-op. I have no issue with people setting up co-ops in a free market.
        WalterBright 4y ago
thebradbain 4y ago
An organization that is also supposed to be a non-profit and therefore focused on only using that money to fulfill its larger mission statement
munk-a 4y ago
It is a business but arguably it should be more focused on education and community enrichment than pure profits. Not everything in life needs to be focused on profit.
- BobbyJo 4y ago
  It's far easier to optimize for profit then theoretical ideals. The issue here isn't that they are optimizing for profit, the issue is that incentives have put that pursuit at odds with the university's core mission (education/community), as opposed to keeping it aligned with it. Pursuit of profit should keep you accountable for the services you provide, not detract from them.
  - komali2 4y ago
    So it's easier to optimize for profit, so what? How can your core mission be education but "you're optimizing for profit?" Either your core mission is education or it isn't. I feel like this is the kind of goal setting miss I see businesses make all the time. They'll be doing be doing some version of the ubiquitous value setting activity, and as ideas are pitched someone will be like "wait, isn't our most basic value to just make money?" Sure, whatever, but what does that tell us? A distraction. If money is really so important, just remember the story of the new CEO of iirc a failing iron production business that repeatedly answered the board's questions on how he'll turn profit with "we're going to be the safest iron production business in America." The goal was achieved by fostering a culture of transparency, adopting new technology like emails for internal flat hierarchy communication, etc, and it did become the safest, but also highly profitable. Persuit of profit alone justifies short term behavior constantly. The firing of 20% of your workforce could be seen as justifiable when your goal is persuit of profit. Basically I think it's wrong to try to go cross eyed having "persuit of profit" always there while also trying to set some other "idealistic" goal. Just stay focused!
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      The beauty of the free market is that the way to maximize profit is to maximize customer satisfaction.

JKCalhoun 4y ago

Businesses have public relations. This is a bad look.

throwawaysleep 4y ago
Given the high cost of tuition, are people really going to want to pay grad students higher salaries? A lot of nice things in life require that someone make a low wage so they are affordable to you.
- JKCalhoun 4y ago
  Yes, I think that tuitions need to come down as well.
- komali2 4y ago
  Require? Genuinely require? It seems to me the high cost comes from attempting to create profit margin. If the profit is basically eliminated, the person can have the high wage, and we can have the nice things.
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    > If the profit is basically eliminated, the person can have the high wage, and we can have the nice things. Somehow, however, such Marxist implementations never deliver those nice things.
    - komali2 4y ago
      Co-ops are Marxist? If so, wow, Marxist businesses are remarkably profitable, productive [1], and resilient [2]! [1] https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/worker-cooperatives-are-more-productive-than-normal-companies/ https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/worker-cooperative... [2] https://www.uk.coop/sites/default/files/2020-10/co-operative_survival_1.pdf https://www.uk.coop/sites/default/files/2020-10/co-operative...
      - WalterBright 4y ago
        If they are so remarkably profitable, why aren't they pervasive?
        komali2 4y ago
        Aren't they? The top 300 cooperatives apparently accounted for 2.2 trillion in turnover back in 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20171022081215/http://monitor.coop/ https://web.archive.org/web/20171022081215/http://monitor.co...
        WalterBright 4y ago
        So go set one up, then! And btw, none of the text in your cite says anything about 2.2 trillion in turnover.
        komali2 4y ago
        Thanks, I'll need to update the link on wikipedia later, it was correct last week. I have set up a co-op. It's going quite well.
        WalterBright 4y ago
        Good luck with your co-op. I have no issue with people setting up co-ops in a free market.
      - WalterBright 4y ago

thebradbain 4y ago

An organization that is also supposed to be a non-profit and therefore focused on only using that money to fulfill its larger mission statement

munk-a 4y ago

It is a business but arguably it should be more focused on education and community enrichment than pure profits. Not everything in life needs to be focused on profit.

BobbyJo 4y ago
It's far easier to optimize for profit then theoretical ideals. The issue here isn't that they are optimizing for profit, the issue is that incentives have put that pursuit at odds with the university's core mission (education/community), as opposed to keeping it aligned with it. Pursuit of profit should keep you accountable for the services you provide, not detract from them.
- komali2 4y ago
  So it's easier to optimize for profit, so what? How can your core mission be education but "you're optimizing for profit?" Either your core mission is education or it isn't. I feel like this is the kind of goal setting miss I see businesses make all the time. They'll be doing be doing some version of the ubiquitous value setting activity, and as ideas are pitched someone will be like "wait, isn't our most basic value to just make money?" Sure, whatever, but what does that tell us? A distraction. If money is really so important, just remember the story of the new CEO of iirc a failing iron production business that repeatedly answered the board's questions on how he'll turn profit with "we're going to be the safest iron production business in America." The goal was achieved by fostering a culture of transparency, adopting new technology like emails for internal flat hierarchy communication, etc, and it did become the safest, but also highly profitable. Persuit of profit alone justifies short term behavior constantly. The firing of 20% of your workforce could be seen as justifiable when your goal is persuit of profit. Basically I think it's wrong to try to go cross eyed having "persuit of profit" always there while also trying to set some other "idealistic" goal. Just stay focused!
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    The beauty of the free market is that the way to maximize profit is to maximize customer satisfaction.