Why Labor Unions Won’t Save Higher Education

It operates in a different labor environment.

These are not the greatest times for university faculty and nonacademic staff. Falling enrollments have squeezed budgets at many schools, leading to small or even non-existent salary increases during a period of enhanced inflation. The salary surveys of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) showed an inflation-adjusted decrease in average salaries of professors of 7.5 percent from 2019 to 2022. It seems likely the enrollment decline will not reverse itself dramatically, and the near certainty of a forthcoming decline in the size of potential freshmen classes because of the nation’s “birth dearth” enhances that pessimistic assessment. Flagship public schools West Virginia University and the University of Arizona have announced needs for draconian budget reductions, including faculty dismissals, a problem revealed also recently by a $239 million budget deficit at the private elite University of Chicago. Selective admission Miami University of Ohio reported that a $36 million budget deficit might force eliminating 18 majors — and ultimately some faculty positions. Rarely a month goes by without some small liberal arts college announcing it is closing. The near certainty of reduced private donations from irate wealthy alumni have even constrained uber rich schools like Harvard from showing expansive largesse toward their hired hands.
READ MORE: College Jocks Given Green Light to Unionize
In such an environment, some university employees look to unionization as a panacea. Faculty union leaders sometimes see vast funds for salary increases obtainable by cutting a large administrative bureaucracy —reducing the bloat associated with nonessential bureaucrats can save the day and allow for hefty pay raises. Many campus employees seem to agree, as there has been an uptick in unionization efforts on campus, even extending, unbelievably, to students at that great athletic powerhouse, Dartmouth College (this season: six wins, 21 losses) and its basketball team,...