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Comment by pc86 | Hacker News Reader

> Not that loan-free educations are bad, but why is Brown raising $120M from alumni and the like, rather than lowering their tuition by $120M?

Because the Third Associate Dean of Humanities can't fund their $600k salary with the goodwill from a more reasonable tuition.

Snark aside, it's because the administrators are attacking a symptom - high tuition prices - and not the illness - administrative bloat and universities that are not run by academics, but by Professional Educators who in many cases have never taught a class in their lives, or haven't taught in the past n decades.

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According to Bain between 1995 and 2010 universities are proportionately spending significantly less on instruction and more on admin and support, and many of the universities spending is unsustainable. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11337193

This parallels the healthcare sector, where administrative costs have outpaced the cost of actual care. Both are markets heavily distorted by the federal government.

I worry that there's no solution to these problems that won't displace very many workers. One man's cost is another man's salary.

Both are markets heavily distorted by the federal government.

That's one way to look at it. Another way to look at it is that those "markets" are fundamentally distorted by the in-elasticity of demand. People generally need education and healthcare.

Coincidentally, that's the way almost all of the non-US world chooses to look at it.

Are you sure you put the snark aside?

OK maybe some of the snark was still there, but at least I got rid of the hyperbole :)

If their Humanities Dean gets paid that much, their football coach must be a billionaire from salary alone.

I'm no fan of coaches being the most highly paid public employees in most states by any stretch (especially with the athletes earning at most a free ride and a rubber-stamped business degree), but at least the sports teams are bringing in revenue, and people willingly donate to build a new stadium, etc.

The Humanities Dean isn't a revenue center for the college, and nobody is (knowingly) donating so s/he can get a new office.

Revenue is easy. Anyone can bring in revenue. Uber brings in revenue. The more important question is is the athletic department as a whole even profitable? At Berkeley, the football coaches make $16.3M.

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/matier-ross/article/Cal-footba...

The law school deans make $333,847. At the same time, Cal Athletics faces largest debt among all college programs.

https://www1.salary.com/CA/Berkeley/Dean-of-Law-salary.html

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-01-04/college-f...

So your humanities deans vs revenue digression is just whataboutism.

Most athletic departments fund not only the football coach's salary but the salaries of the coaches and staff for all the other "non-revenue" sports as well as all the scholarships. The big thing that has developed in the past decade are the conference TV deals such as the Big Ten Network. Schools make a LOT of money from that, as well as from other licensed merchandise, ticket sales, and donations.

If Cal Athletics is in debt, they are doing it wrong.

Athletics salaries and facilities are very visible and often breathtaking, but in general they are not the cause of tuition inflation.

Yes, my alma mater is doing it wrong but the vast majority of athletic departments are also doing it wrong. Although I was a ‘tree’ guy when they spent the seed corn on the stadium upgrade, I do see the point of an elite sports program and ours overall is quite elite. And still Cal is doing it wrong.

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