Oh I should note that capex and opex aren't treated the same in grant-land either, and funding agencies can put limits on university overhead for infrastructure

Oh I should note that capex and opex aren't treated the same in grant-land either, and funding agencies can put limits on university overhead for infrastructure grants etc. so that's not all apples to apples. The benefit to the university for soft salary or funding grad students etc. in both scenarios is the same, but getting money for a new computer cluster or a synchrotron or whatever isn't, typically.