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Teaching college is no longer a middle-class job, and everyone should care

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Re: Teaching college is no longer a middle-class job, and everyone should care

#271

Post by crpatino »

webhat wrote: post #267
crpatino wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly why do you think that discussing this issues in the open will automatically result in "instructors will actually be paid well, and students can learn in an environment that doesn't treat their faculty as cheap throw away labor."??? If the information in this article does not result in behavior changes (non tenured lecturers walking out of raw deals, or students requiring their University to disclose and guara…

As a student, or parent, knowing that many universities are paying their adjunct instructors poorly meaning the instructors are turning their classes into popularity contests - by inflating grades and making the class 'easy' - to ensure that they have a job next year would worry me. I interpret it to mean that a degree from some 'reputable' universities might be as good as one of the degree mill universities. My hope…

I do not know if this will "worry people", but I am already worried and planning accordingly. I send my kids to private school (strong academic quality, not overly posh) in order to give them a good foundation to start from, but the assumption is that there wont be a "college fund" and they might end up going to the State University if (a) they get a full scholarship (not the credit sham that passes for it nowadays) or, (b) they get their act together as young business man and pay full tuition on their own. My wife knows how I feel about this and is fully on board, while my parents and in-laws think that I am a cheap bastard.

Being children, I have not yet discussed this with them. However, I plan to have this topic fully explored with each of them well in advance of their freshman year on high school.

Re: Teaching college is no longer a middle-class job, and everyone should care

#272

Post by dnautics »

eli_gottlieb wrote: post #184
dnautics wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, 'going back to the 19th century (-first half of the 20th century)' is equivalent to imagining a higher education system without student loans. Don't see what the big deal is.

In the 19th century and the pre-social-democratic 20th century, most universities had no student loans because they charged steep fees in cold cash. If you want to eliminate student debt without eliminating students, you need to look at the social-democratic universities of the post-WW2 era.

that's not true; the pre-interest cost of universities has outstripped inflation many many fold in the last 30 years. The pre-WW2 era colleges were almost certainly less expensive in real purchasing power terms than they are now.

Re: Teaching college is no longer a middle-class job, and everyone should care

#273

Post by grondilu »

mercurial wrote: post #260
grondilu wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure which country you're talking about exactly, but don't countries in Scandinavia benefit from large resources of oil and natural gaz in the North Sea? That sure eases welfare.

I'm a French expat living in Denmark, which is definitely not blessed by large amounts of resources of any kind. But you could take Germany as another example of a country who is not about to run out of other people's money any time soon. Or to take examples in a different way: Spain and Ireland's issues were mostly caused by a housing bubble.

« Denmark has considerably large deposits of oil and natural gas in the North Sea and ranks as number 32 in the world among net exporters of crude oil[101] and was producing 259,980 barrels of crude oil a day in 2009 »

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denmark

Re: Teaching college is no longer a middle-class job, and everyone should care

#274

Post by ja27 »

autokad wrote: post #201
Aqueous wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. I worked for a university briefly as a staff member. Our university sung far and wide about how it just raised $400 million for its endowment in its most recent fundraising campaign, and yet, it couldn't afford to pay me more than a $25,000 salary in the IT department. How on earth is this possible? It's probably in all the unseen costs they pay out in contracts to subcontractors. But another clue might be this:…

staff are generally thought of as costs and universities try to pay them as little as possible expecting high turnover. at least that's my assumption based on their actions. with adjuncts it depends on the major and class. the whole idea is that they are not full time, so if a person chooses JUST to do that , then I am not surprised they have a hard time getting by. I have a full time job and adjunct (the adjunct pos…

My wife has taught as an adjunct (music) at a pretty large state school. She had to decline the last couple of offers from them because we self-imposed a rule that she can't lose money by teaching there. That's right, the cost of gas (just 21 miles round-trip) plus her parking pass for the semester would exceed the amount they were willing to pay.

Re: Teaching college is no longer a middle-class job, and everyone should care

#275

Post by mercurial »

grondilu wrote: post #273
mercurial wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a French expat living in Denmark, which is definitely not blessed by large amounts of resources of any kind. But you could take Germany as another example of a country who is not about to run out of other people's money any time soon. Or to take examples in a different way: Spain and Ireland's issues were mostly caused by a housing bubble.

« Denmark has considerably large deposits of oil and natural gas in the North Sea and ranks as number 32 in the world among net exporters of crude oil[101] and was producing 259,980 barrels of crude oil a day in 2009 » https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denmark

It seems I have underestimated the Danish oil reserves. However, oil export is a small fraction of its economy. I haven't been able to find an accurate figure, but according to Danmark statistik [1], it was about 8.17% of Danish exports in April 2014, which is very far from making Denmark into an oil-based economy like Norway is.

1: http://www.dst.dk/pukora/epub/Nyt/2014/NR300.pdf (in Danish, but it would go under the "Brændsels -og smørestoffer o.l." category)

Re: Teaching college is no longer a middle-class job, and everyone should care

#276

Post by tn13 »

jjoonathan wrote: post #168
tn13 wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People do not get paid based on how much money the business makes. On the other hand they get paid based on how much value they add. Someone whose skill is French Language is surely is not much worth compared to someone who knows how to make pancakes. I will not be surprised that a lot of college teachers teaching skills of no use are finding it hard to make enough money.

> On the other hand they get paid based on how much value they add. Nope. That only happens if they're scarce. If they aren't scarce (or are otherwise deleveraged) they get paid minimum wage regardless of the value they create. > Someone whose skill is French Language is surely is not much worth compared to someone who knows how to make pancakes. You seem to be awfully certain of that. Unless you meant to assume what…

> Nope. That only happens if they're scarce. If they aren't scarce (or are otherwise deleveraged) they get paid minimum wage regardless of the value they create.

That is rubbish, mostly the left liberal hippy logic. If a person is valuable there is always another competitor who will hire him for a higher pay to get the competitive advantage.

Re: Teaching college is no longer a middle-class job, and everyone should care

#277

Post by tn13 »

neolefty wrote: post #142
tn13 wrote: post #116

This just means that college teachers in certain cases are in high supply.

One of the callout quotes from the article: Of course it’s possible to love what one does, be good at it, and still be exploited. A job that people love, with a glut of qualified people. "I always dreamed of being a professor."

The left liberals put themselves in high seats and decide who is being exploited and who is not. This is absolute thuggery. A Job and salary is the contract between two parties and everyone else should stay out of it.

Re: Teaching college is no longer a middle-class job, and everyone should care

#278

Post by tn13 »

jjoonathan wrote: post #168
tn13 wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People do not get paid based on how much money the business makes. On the other hand they get paid based on how much value they add. Someone whose skill is French Language is surely is not much worth compared to someone who knows how to make pancakes. I will not be surprised that a lot of college teachers teaching skills of no use are finding it hard to make enough money.

> On the other hand they get paid based on how much value they add. Nope. That only happens if they're scarce. If they aren't scarce (or are otherwise deleveraged) they get paid minimum wage regardless of the value they create. > Someone whose skill is French Language is surely is not much worth compared to someone who knows how to make pancakes. You seem to be awfully certain of that. Unless you meant to assume what…

Obviously if they are not scarce means they are indeed cheaper and makes perfect sense to give them just a minimum wage.
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