[lbo-talk] Academia's indentured servants

[Wojtek S]

On April 8, 2013, the *New York Times*
reported<http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/08/education/gap-in-university-faculty-pay-continues-to-grow-report-finds.html?_r=2&>
that
76 percent of American university faculty are adjunct professors - an
all-time high. Unlike tenured faculty, whose annual salaries can top
$160,000, adjunct professors make an average of $2,700 per course and
receive no health care or other benefits.

Most adjuncts teach at multiple universities while still not making enough
to stay above the poverty
line<http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/08/2012820102749246453.html>.
Some are on welfare<http://chronicle.com/article/From-Graduate-School-to/131795/>

 or homeless<http://chronicle.com/blogs/onhiring/adjunct-emergency-fund/29317>.
Others depend on charity
drives<http://chronicle.com/article/As-Part-Time-Faculty-Wait-for/136723/?cid=oh&utm_source=oh&utm_medium=en>
held
by their peers. Adjuncts are generally not
allowed<http://occupycunynews.org/2012/03/02/hunter-adjuncts-hold-hallway-office-hours-to-protest-end-of-office-space-poor-labor-conditions/>
to
have offices or participate in faculty meetings. When they ask for a living
wage or benefits, they can be
fired<http://chronicle.com/article/For-Adjuncts-Who-Take-a-Role/138429/?key=HD8hIldmaSIeY3FiNT5GZj5dbiA%2BMRgkaiNNYn1xblxWFQ%3D%3D>.
Their contingent status allows them no recourse.

No one forces a scholar to work as an adjunct. So why do some of America's
brightest PhDs - many of whom are authors of books and articles on labour,
power, or injustice - accept such terrible conditions?

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/04/20134119156459616.html

-- 
Wojtek

"An anarchist is a neoliberal without money."