New president must lead U out of gig economy

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The University of Minnesota will soon begin in earnest the search for its next permanent president, choosing what to prioritize in this important position.

The University Senate recently passed a resolution calling on the administration to "invest in its employees across the system as the centerpiece of its efforts to maintain and enhance leading-edge mission delivery." The faculty union for the Duluth and Crookston campuses is currently in negotiations to win the same commitment. But the administration is proving resistant.

We need a new president who will dispense with the rotten worldview that seems to have consumed much of higher education leadership in recent decades, as administrators in Minnesota and elsewhere mimic the most repugnant elements of the modern gig economy.

Among other things, this has meant a shift from full-time, tenure-line faculty positions to lower-paid, contingent instructorships, as well as an effort to degrade the conditions of all rank-and-file employees. And I'm not just talking about salaries and wages, which for the vast majority of the university's workforce — though not necessarily coaches or administrators — have remained stagnant or even declined in real terms.

Faculty and staff have long accepted lower pay for the privilege of working at a public-serving institution. But in return they've expected the university to compensate them in other ways — a strong health insurance program, retirement plan and so on. In recent years the university has backtracked on earlier commitments.

Taking a page out of the corporate playbook, 21st century administrators have embraced what author Naomi Klein calls the "shock doctrine," exploiting temporary challenges to seek permanent changes.

In 2011, for example, the university took advantage of a one-time budget setback to reduce its retirement-plan contributions for all employees hired after Jan. 2, 2012. Yet, we later learned, not all employees were created equal. At least one — President Eric Kaler — would soon enjoy "major retirement contribution increases."

Then, a decade ago, the administration escalated its attack on employee health benefits by citing a potential future excise tax to permanently shift insurance costs onto its workers. This phantom excise tax never materialized; Congress repealed the future tax in 2019. But the university got what it wanted: deductibles, higher premiums and exponentially higher copays.

More recently, when the pandemic struck in 2020, the university took advantage of the budgetary uncertainty to go on the offensive against its most vulnerable faculty. On the system's second-largest campus, where about 40% of the instructional staff hold lower-paid "term" appointments that require periodic renewal, the administration eliminated even the short-term commitments it had previously made to theses faculty members. Instructors who had once worried about whether they'd still have a job next year now have to worry about whether they'll still have a job tomorrow.

In every case, the administration claims that it simply lacks the resources to operate as it once did. On the surface this sounds plausible, as the state Legislature has shirked its responsibility to cover at least 67% of the cost of public higher education. The result has been the effective privatization of our public universities, with tuition now the largest single source of operating revenue.

But the administration's claims of hardship are ultimately a dodge. Unlike those of faculty and staff, administrative salaries (and the cost of administration) have soared over the last 40 years. No public institution with over 600 administrators paid more than the governor can credibly claim it lacks the resources to fairly compensate workers.

Administrators will tell you that these inflated salaries are necessary to recruit the best administrative talent. That's bunkum. While the university certainly does have a number of capable managers, too many others are sycophants or incompetent careerists who have failed to embrace the institution's public-service mission. And lest we forget, colleges and universities were well run decades ago without their leadership insisting on stratospheric pay.

The University of Minnesota is a world-class institution because of its outstanding faculty and staff. We need a leader who does more than pay them lip service.

Scott Laderman is a professor of history at the University of Minnesota, Duluth, and a former president of its faculty union.