[eigenvector]

In my experience in governance at A Highly Ranked Canadian Research University, where most top administrative posts were held by tenured professors, they tend to take the view of "well, I successfully negotiated the gauntlet of obtaining tenure through my research, if you can't do the same, tough luck."

Dean, department head and provostial positions are heavily weighted toward highly successful researchers who have effectively "retired" into administration and seem not to consider teaching to be one of the university's core functions.

It's easier to convince these people to hire another janitor @ $70k/year than to give a contract teacher a full-time job at the same salary since to them bringing non-researchers into the ranks of permanent faculty is equivalent to letting the barbarians into Rome.

[kylebrown]

The last paragraph from one of his follow-up articles, The Importance of Going Viral, is relevant:

"In fact the response has been overwhelmingly positive from everyone, except regular faculty. Not one message of support from anyone in a tenured position, in Physics or any other department. The status quo has considerable appeal when you are in the position of privilege."

[theorique]

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!" (Upton Sinclair)

[markhahn]

$70k janitors, what a hoot! yeah, not so much.

[stevenbedrick]

When you count in the cost of benefits, retirement, overhead, etc., I can easily imagine a full-time janitorial position costing the university 70k.

[markhahn]

Fair enough. But this guy is talking about his takehome, not the fully-encumbered price for his position.

[mooreds]

I think part of the point is that the attractiveness of a contract instructor is that the fully encumbered price is very much closer to the take home salary than for a tenured professor (or indeed, even a janitor).