Cash Cow of Compassion

The last redoubt of concern for the common man is ridiculously awash in the cash that keeps eluding the object of its affections but then, maybe that’s where it comes from.

The Almanac of Higher Education shows us that colleges and universities took in about a trillion dollars this year and spent roughly that amount. Most of these institutions have multi-million dollar endowments, even some community colleges. Most parents do not.

Professors make about $100,000 a year with tenure while the untenured lecturers and associates range between $45-80,000 a year. Ironically, this is where most share-the- wealth schemes originate.

The creators of these plots don’t seem to realize that in the search for deep pockets they themselves are in a target-rich environment.

Can someone explain to me what this article means? It reads like snippets from a larger article, but it is the whole thing.

It seems similar to other posted articles but of a little different format. Perhaps the poster is fishing for hits to his website which he would get anyway if posted in a normal fashion.

That said he makes an important point:

Professors make about $100,000 a year with tenure while the untenured lecturers and associates range between $45-80,000 a year. Ironically, this is where most share-the- wealth schemes originate.

I get from this that those who advocate socialist share-the-wealth policies are themselves freeloaders. Most Leftists find a way to game the system they so oppose (free enterprise) by finding employment with the government, the education system, foundations and trusts, and even when in the business community it is usually in the financial institutions where they game the system even more. They use those positions to undermine the system which is giving them the free ride. They don't care because they think they will be unaffected while feeling morally superior to the rest of us.

Sooner or later that model us unsustainable. It is amazing and a tribute to free enterprise that it can still pull the wagon with so many others riding in it.

It is common practice now to staff university and community college teaching posts with adjuncts & junior staff, who make far less, of course. Many schools have anywhere from 25-75% as instructors or part-time adjuncts. Part-timers get no benes at all, just a supposedly higher per hour wage.

Often, <3% of a professor’s performance rating governs his or her performance rating. Peer review and acceptance in the American Academy of Letters is a rackett, being based on whether someone passes the political finish line.

Hiring ne’er do wells to teach the ‘developmental’ (AKA, high school for lazy, gimme dat grade students who can’t cut college) or beginning courses (including the foreign-born/international TAs who barely speak English) cuts university budgets enough to be able to pay Department Deans, IT heads, etc., etc. their $100s of thousands of dollars. Yes. You got that right. Go look at university budgets, even some private ones, and you’ll see 10, 15, 20 people who are NOT members of the Boards of Directors/Regents who earn just that much.

I used to have a problem with the $1+ million coaches, until I realized that athletics often pays for itself completely. Winning is correlated to alumni giving, but athletics is really its own corporation, and it’s usually run separately from the university....except when the grades are doled out, of course (for some of the athletes anyway).

I know of one university, however, that used to have 1, count that, ONE man to service and fix all the elevators on a campus of 100s of buildings, however. Makes you think about where the money really goes, doesn’t it?

The seemy side of education beyond K-12 is very, very dirty pool. Board members vote themselves cars. Deans are kept on without showing up to work. Colleges dip into endowments and fire long-time staff without consequence. Gift monies are somehow used for other purposes. Suits brought for malfeasance somehow get lost in ‘the system’ and no one hears a peep after awhile. Professors hide their misappropriations of monies from grants under investigations of a scape goat staffer who then is convicted, loses a pension and lands in jail for something—and then the profs skate with that “who, me?” look on their faces.

University life at the administrative level isn’t just socialistic. It teaches you that wisdom and goodness have almost no place there.

All of these instances are true stories. As God as my witness. And no, I won’t say where, so don’t ask.

Peer review and acceptance in the American Academy of Letters is a rackett, being based on whether someone passes the political finish line.

That may need a little expansion although it is succinct and part of a well written post. The tenured Leftists only give tenure to their kind. That keeps out the dreaded opposing ideas. In addition they help each other "get published" which is part of the track to a Ph.D. and more money and prestige. After a while most of the well known academics are Leftists. They then get all of the face time to influence public opinion and provide support for Leftist ideas and policies.

It is an incestuous racket, as you say.

As far as your comment on athletics most remember SMU getting the death sentence years ago for recruiting violations, etc. SMU had done quite well and had grown in national stature because of it athletic department, especially the football team. This seemed to rile some in the faculty who wanted SMU to be recognized for its academics. SMU was simply doing what everyone else was doing but there was a handicapped professor who, other than his leg braces and crutches, looked a lot like Robert Reisch, turned out to be behind it all. He thought universities should not even have athletics. They should be strictly for academics, or so he said, and he and like-minded friends set out to destroy SMU's athletic program.

I often wondered if his physical condition affected his attitude toward athletes or if he was just a spiteful Leftist. Probably both.

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