Realist, not conformist analysis of the latest financial, business and political news

As The Universities Show Worker Control Is A Horrible System

A complaint that the universities have two different workforces. There are those with lovely plush jobs, decent pay, the best working conditions in the world – shit, who wouldn’t like a job where you’re paid to think about anything you want to – and then those doing the piecework and treated as scum. Sure, those in the grievance studies departments should be treated that way but still.

The reason we have this is worker control.

Thousands of academic staff at British universities are being treated as second-class citizens on precarious contracts, says a report highlighting the “alarming rise of mass casualised labour” in higher education.

The report by the University and College Union claims institutions have created a pool of low-paid staff to teach undergraduates, conduct research and work in libraries, despite having advanced postgraduate or other academic qualifications.

So, why do we have this? Because the people with the cushy jobs are the people running the places. And they get to decide who and how many get cushty treatment and who doesn’t. They thus create that class of helots to make their lives easier.

Which is the problem with worker control. The first group of workers in there limit off the joys of independence and produce that servile class below them. This applies to universities because they’re one of the few areas where we do actually have such worker control. This being a contention easy enough to prove.

American universities are even more controlled by faculty than British ones are. And the complaints about tenure track and adjunct are very much larger over there than here.

As it turns out the workers are just as interested in featherbedding and privileged treatment as the capitalists. They too will put a moat around their privileges.

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Esteban
Esteban
4 years ago

Another example – in the NFL the collective bargaining agreement with the players union greatly limits pay for players in their first 3-4 years. A player signing his rookie contract may get less than half of what he could have absent these restrictions. The reason, you ask? All the players sitting in on the contract negotiations are well past their 4th year of experience.

Spike
Spike
4 years ago

California’s new law extinguishing the gig economy is more of the same. Established legislators want to decree mandatory fringe benefits for Uber drivers, and unions are eager to skim money off their paycheck for “acting in their interests.” You benefit enormously by already being in the racket, and shutting the door behind you. Truckers paid per shipment have gotten an injunction; columnists paid per submission have not.

Mr Yan
Mr Yan
4 years ago

I know a Head Of Languages who gets £90k for running the department. It is of course, the most wretched hive of Leftist scum and villainy. Definitely a group of people over prompted and beyond any reasonable scale of pay for what is involved.

Mr Yan
Mr Yan
4 years ago
Reply to  Mr Yan

promoted not prompted 8-(

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