Facing poverty, academics turn to sex work and sleeping in cars • Hacker News Board

Re: Facing poverty, academics turn to sex work and sleeping in cars

#141

Post by handsomechad » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 4:01 PM UTC

petra wrote: post #93

One thing i didn't understand from the story: those are smart people, motivated people, with good people's skills. All the things our economy loves. Why don't they say "fuck it" and change profession, to something more decent ? it would be hard, but is it possible ? And i say this without judgement, just out of curiosity.

This is honestly the question that pops into my head as well. The sibling comment doesn't give an answer, just restates that the status quo is suboptimal for society. That very well may be the case, but parent is asking why people aren't reacting to these incentives on an individual basis.

Re: Facing poverty, academics turn to sex work and sleeping in cars

#142

Post by dogruck » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 4:01 PM UTC

Market dynamics at work.

Reminds me of Bukowski:

Born like this

Into this

As the chalk faces smile

As Mrs. Death laughs

As the elevators break

As political landscapes dissolve

As the supermarket bag boy holds a college degree

Re: Facing poverty, academics turn to sex work and sleeping in cars

#143

Post by sliverstorm » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 4:02 PM UTC

gerbilly wrote: post #114

xythian wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure why you're downvoted. This is a real problem that is palpable for anyone that has worked in higher ed since the 1980s as most universities have moved to act more and more like for-profit entities. The reasons for this move are complex, and one result is a rise in well-paid administrators and low-paid adjuncts with a decline in tenured faculty. https://www.theguardian.com/education/2010/mar/30/academic-b.…

> most universities have moved to act more and more like for-profit entities. I think this reflects a larger trend. Most institutions are taking on the rituals of the dominant organizing principle in society: the corporation. I believe this is why church groups are having "annual general meetings" and that formerly not for profit institutions are mimicking the organizational structure of corporations: meetings, hiera…

Well, naturally. Your organization has a revenue stream (donations). It has expenditures (church upkeep). To avoid embezzlement, wasteful spending, & getting scalped by necessary services, you conduct group review of budget goals & the books.

Re: Facing poverty, academics turn to sex work and sleeping in cars

#144

Post by munin » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 4:02 PM UTC

samfriedman wrote: post #105

xythian wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience (former PhD student and instructor and my spouse is a full-time faculty and program director), if you're a tenured faculty member at a R1 university, then grant writing is your job. You're expected to be self-funding and the only way to do this is to grind out grants and pass the work onto graduate students and staff. And, you pay a ~50% tax on your grant award as 'overhead' to the university, so you…

I'm surprised more high-tier universities don't supply tenured PIs with dedicated grant writers, or at least easy access to them. Many of my social circle work as grad students at a private R1 institution, and I've seen a vast difference in the experience of students with a PI who self-funds and writes grants all day - less interaction, most of the teaching and mentoring is done by postdocs - and a PI that has an alt…

> I'm surprised more high-tier universities don't supply tenured PIs with dedicated grant writers, or at least easy access to them.

Who would pay them?

Re: Facing poverty, academics turn to sex work and sleeping in cars

#145

Post by wolfram74 » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 4:02 PM UTC

Leon wrote: post #98

irrational wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The money goes to Football (and not the good kind of Football).

Usually Football pays for itself.

as of 2015, it seemed not so much http://www.ncaa.org/about/resources/media-center/news/athlet...

Re: Facing poverty, academics turn to sex work and sleeping in cars

#146

Post by semi-nontechncl » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 4:03 PM UTC

I was an adjunct for a year at a well-known arts college in the US. Some programs were made up almost completely of adjuncts with only one or two full-time professors. Since this was an arts program those adjuncts were working in the field. While it was good for students to have professors who were working professionals, it does mean that those professors are less invested in the program as a whole and since they aren't full-time/ tenured they don't have a lot of sway to influence the program since they can easily be fired.

On the other hand, the program I taught in was made up almost exclusively of full-time professors who were basically tenured. Many of the full-time professors were really great, but a lot of them hadn't created any real professional work in their field in a very long time. The tenured professors had been teaching at the school for decades, some for forty years. I quickly left the school the school when I realized I would have to wait for someone to die in my program before I would find a full-time teaching position.

My conclusion after teaching for a year as an adjunct was that: 1) Adjunct teaching is basically a side gig that you do outside of your full-time job 2) All the money the school was bringing in is going to administration or facilities/buildings, which are constantly growing 3) Full-time professors who finally retire will be replaced with adjuncts, which consolidates the administration's power. 4) College feels outdated to me. Teaching a bunch of students to use photoshop in a classroom is really inefficient compared to video tutorials where everyone can learn at their own pace and rewind the video as needed. 5) College is way too expensive, especially for students pursuing the arts who may struggle after they graduate.

Re: Facing poverty, academics turn to sex work and sleeping in cars

#147

Post by kd0amg » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 4:03 PM UTC

aswanson wrote: post #82

throwaway2016a wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This varies hugely by school. A lot of state run Universities have very competitive salaries because their reputation depends on retaining rock star professors. Adjuncts are a different story. I taught as an adjunct part time at a state school where professor made $150k. I made $5000 per course. I did it more of less for fun because I like teaching. Which is not bad for extra pay on the side but terrible if it is you…

Are compsci phds in high demand in academia, or do they suffer the same oversupply condition as the general professorial market?

There is less of an oversupply because it's easier for CS PhDs to just go to industry (possibly in a non-research position) than it is in a lot of other fields, but I think it's still unrealistic to expect every CS PhD who seeks a tenure-track position to find one.

Re: Facing poverty, academics turn to sex work and sleeping in cars

#148

Post by sol_remmy » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 4:03 PM UTC

vidarh wrote: post #113

3pt14159 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In parts of Europe there the expression: "That's Texas." It roughly means "That's crazy." but with a 'Murica flavor to it. Lately, I've been finding myself frequently thinking: "That's Texas." Let me get this straight. Take a course load of 4 double semester courses per year with 200 hours of class time total in the given year. Let's double it to 400 hours just to be safe to include exam marking and office hours. A s…

> In parts of Europe there the expression: "That's Texas." It roughly means "That's crazy." but with a 'Murica flavor to it. According to this article [1] in Washington Post, the first occurrence of Texas as "crazy" in Norwegian dates to 1957. Makes me wonder if it's used this way in other European countries too, and whether or not the etymology is independent. It's worth noting that unlike the term "Amerikanske tils…

Actually Texas has cheap, well-funded state schools. It is financially a well-managed state.

Maybe you should switch to saying "That's Illinois" or "That's Chicago", they're the dysfunctional state now.

Re: Facing poverty, academics turn to sex work and sleeping in cars

#149

Post by munin » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 4:04 PM UTC

tcpekin wrote: post #131

skosuri wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear, a 60%-70% overhead rate implies that the university is taking 37-42% of the money (for each dollar spent, another 0.60-0.70 goes to university). In addition, other expenses like tuition and equipment have no overhead taken out.

Tuition/stipend for grad students and equipment most definitely has overhead, at least from my experience in the UC system.

Tuition is funny money though, it's money the university is charging itself for nothing. You pay tuition to take a 3 credit class that never meets, doesn't have an instructor, and has no assignments. It's just there to justify the $10k a semester or whatever the university wants to charge the grant. Grad students in CS at least are expected to provide their own equipment, also.

Re: Facing poverty, academics turn to sex work and sleeping in cars

#150

Post by noonespecial » Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 4:04 PM UTC

Academia is one place where a UBI would make a huge difference. These are people who obviously do what they do for motivations other than a paycheck. Organizing society so they don't have to live in their cars in church parking lots to do it would be an unalloyed win.