Consensus on Academic Bloat

A man who Accuracy in Academia rarely sees eye-to-eye with nonetheless makes a  good point  in the October 8, 2010 issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education. “As for costs, universities typically spend only one-third of their budgets on faculty salaries,” Cary Nelson of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) writes. “Despite more than 10 years of education after high school, most people standing in front of a college classroom earn less than $60,000 a year, considering that contingent faculty members, who are not eligible for tenure, make up two-thirds of the faculty work force.”

“Most earn less than $35,000. And most graduate students paid as teachers earn less than $20,000 a year.”

“It’s not faculty salaries that have grown so much over the years; it’s the increasing number of administrators and their salaries—along with unnecessary building—that is breaking the higher education bank. That’s where your tuition money goes. Why? Because administrators set one another’s salaries and pad their staffs.”

Nelson is also an English professor at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana. The very issue in which Nelson made these assertions features 56 pages of want ads: 19 for faculty jobs, 14 for administrative posts and another 4 for executive positions. That’s just about 50-50 instructional v. administrative.

“Between 1993 and 2007, the number of full-time administrators per 100 students at America’s leading universities grew by 39 percent, while the number of employees engaged in teaching, research or service only grew by 18 percent,” Jay P. Greene wrote in a study for the Goldwater Institute that came out last summer. “Inflation-adjusted spending on administration per student increased by 61 percent during the same period, while instructional spending per student rose 39 percent.”

“Arizona State University, for example, increased the number of administrators per 100 students by 94 percent during this period while actually reducing the number of employees engaged in instruction, research and service by 2 percent. Nearly half of all full-time employees at Arizona State University are administrators.” The Goldwater Institute is based in Arizona, as its namesake was.

“Meanwhile, the administrative overhead in higher education is staggering,” I wrote five years ago. “Twenty-one cents of every education dollar goes towards instruction.”

“Small wonder, since the ratio of administrators to students has gone up considerably over the past 30 years.” My source was economist Richard Vedder, founder of the Center for College Affordability and Productivity (CAP).

“In 1976, there were three administrators for every one student,” Dr. Vedder said at the time. “Now there are six.”

“A significant reason for the administrative bloat is that students pay only a small portion of administrative costs,” Greene argues. “The lion’s share of university resources comes from the federal and state governments, as well as private gifts and fees for non-educational services.”

“The large and increasing rate of government subsidy for higher education facilitates administrative bloat by insulating students from the costs. Reducing government subsidies would do much to make universities more efficient.”

Between 1976 and 2005, federal spending on education, training, employment and social services rose from $18 billion to $97 billion. Moreover, from 1993 to 2005, which Greene studied, outlays for these activities more than doubled, from $47 billion to $97.5 billion.

Meanwhile, even though the stock market dealt them the same body blows most investors experienced, universities still hold onto substantial endowments. “The nation’s 4-year not-for-profit colleges and universities collectively held more than $400 billion in endowments in 2008,” the Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported early this year. “Some institutions’ large endowments coupled with the high and growing cost of college have led to questions about institutions’ use of endowments.”

At a time when many Americans are depleting precious cash reserves, is it too much to expect institutions of higher learning where they send their children to do the same?

Malcolm A. Kline is the Executive Director of Accuracy in Academia.

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