[HN Gopher] UCLA professor says he's homeless due to low pay
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UCLA professor says he's homeless due to low pay
Author : iancmceachern
Score : 63 points
Date : 2024-10-13 14:43 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.kron4.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.kron4.com)
| switch007 wrote:
| (Brit here). I'm not saying it's a huge salary at all but $70k is
| around $4500/mo after tax. If his rent was $2500, that leaves
| $2000 for everything else, which doesn't seem to equal homeless?
| Paycheck to paycheck probably I guess. What am I missing?
| willcipriano wrote:
| > I'm only being paid $70,000 for this academic year
|
| hmm...
|
| > ac*a*dem*ic year
|
| > the period of the year during which students attend an
| educational institution, usually from September to June.
|
| That's around 100k annualized. Something is rotten in Denmark.
| switch007 wrote:
| I think that's over-interpreting his words
| orionsbelt wrote:
| Nothing - American here and 100% agree with you.
| charlieyu1 wrote:
| 2500 per month of rent is 30k per year. 70k is just a bit more
| than twice of that. In UK he won't even pass credit checks for
| renting
| delichon wrote:
| This is a physicist who could likely make much more in the
| private sector. That's a compromise I've had to make too. I spend
| my weekdays doing work that I have little interest in and has
| less chance of improving the human condition, but it let me buy a
| house and pay the taxes and fees. If I instead choose to do what
| I'm interested in I'd be lucky to afford renting a room in
| someone else's house.
|
| I admire the guy for choosing to do more important work and
| making sacrifices to do it. But I'm not owed a decent salary in
| return for following my own dreams rather than my employer's
| dreams. Nobody is.
| avg_dev wrote:
| Of course you are correct, nobody is ever promised anything
| like the ability to fulfill their dreams or to live a decent
| quality of life. But maybe the universities could pay them a
| living wage for teaching six classes a week.
| orionsbelt wrote:
| $70k is a living wage in Los Angeles; he his homeless by
| choice. To be clear, I'm not saying he is not underpaid. He
| might need a roommate and to live in a crappy apartment and
| not in Westwood to make it workable, which does not seem fair
| for a PhD teaching physics. But it's not homeless level.
| cute_boi wrote:
| People seem to think it is easy to have roommates. My
| roommates were horrible, they wouldn't clean anything,
| blast music and always a privacy risks.
| stavros wrote:
| > People seem to think it is easy to have roommates
|
| It seems to me that they think it's easier than being
| homeless.
| Agentus wrote:
| Homeless in new york and california is easy if u know
| what ur doing.
| stavros wrote:
| I think I'll take the roommates.
| newyankee wrote:
| It is also that US is mostly filled with either very
| large single family homes or apartments in areas where
| rents are generally always high. A focus on efficient,
| individual space that is like 400 sq ft. dense studios
| but which actually translates into lower rent (e.g. 2500$
| in the example to somewhere 1000-1500$ is needed). A lot
| of reforms and time needed for this.
| linguae wrote:
| This is one of the things I miss about Tokyo: there are
| plenty of small apartments there at relatively affordable
| prices. I personally would rather have a 400 sq ft unit
| to myself than to live in a shared house or apartment.
| zrobotics wrote:
| OK, I also live with roommates while I'm saving up a
| downpayment and waiting for mortgage rates to drop. But
| c'mon, there's a huge difference between being homeless
| and having roommates. I've been close to being homeless
| before, and at that point I would have been happy to have
| even the shittiesy roommates if it meant not sleeping on
| the streets.
|
| I'm disgusted at the implication that 70k isn't enough to
| live in LA. Yes, it may not be enough to meet some
| arbitrary standard, but it's insane to say that the
| alternative is being homeless. This is just a spoiled
| rich kid who isn't making enough to keep their previous
| standard of living. There's tons of working class people
| in that same community getting by on way less than 70k
| who aren't getting articles written about them.
| ghaff wrote:
| Well, he even says one of his criteria is he doesn't want
| a long commute. There's cheaper housing in LA. You just
| won't favor it given other options.
| didgeoridoo wrote:
| When I was living in Cambridge (MA) in the early 2010s,
| it was _unthinkable_ to not have a flatmate or four. By
| far the most economical situation was to rent a 4 or 5
| bedroom house. Doing this, you could easily have a sub-1k
| rent within a 10 minute walk of the Harvard or Central T
| stops.
|
| Not to "kids these days" it or anything, but the
| entitlement over not being able to afford _a private,
| one-bedroom apartment in a fantastically-popular city
| center_ is just absolutely mind-blowing.
| linguae wrote:
| It's not always easy living with roommates (I don't like
| it myself), but we all have to make choices. Unless we're
| wealthy, we can't have it all. For many people it's
| either roommates or a long commute, and I know people who
| have roommates _and_ a long commute since that's all they
| can afford. It still beats homelessness.
| ensignavenger wrote:
| Zillow lists over 1300 places for rent in Los Angeles for
| less than $1600 a month, which is easily affordable on a
| $70k salary.
| wolfram74 wrote:
| You've done a bit of a bait and switch, "fulfill their
| dreams" and "decent quality of life" are two very different
| standards. One, sure, we're in a society and sometimes that
| calls for sacrifice, the other, if we can't promise a decent
| life we shouldn't be surprised when people break the contract
| and act in ways that hurt the common good.
| avg_dev wrote:
| i don't think i've done a bait and switch and generally
| don't actually know what you mean by saying that i have
| done so. my point in that sentence was simply that nothing
| is promised by life. society does have norms and people do
| have values. i never said that i don't understand (nor did
| i intend to imply or portray that i don't) why people would
| act in ways that are not to, or hurt, "the common good". it
| is clear why someone who doesn't feel like their life is
| comfortable when they are trying to better "the common
| good" would act against that same common good in order to
| get some peace or enjoyment out of their own existence.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Supply and demand, the pay would increase if there was no one
| willing to take the job. Maybe gig workers and fast food
| workers and everyone else also should be paid living wage...
| I think they are lot more deserving and necessary than people
| working in universities.
| Volundr wrote:
| > Maybe gig workers and fast food workers and everyone else
| also should be paid living wage...
|
| I think you'll find that there's a lot of overlap in the
| group of people who think this guy should be paid more and
| those who want more pay for the people you named.
|
| > I think they are lot more deserving and necessary than
| people working in universities.
|
| I'm not sure I'm prepared to cosign on the idea that the
| guy saving me a trip to pick up my own dinner is producing
| the same value as the guy educating the next generation of
| physicts.
| poincaredisk wrote:
| >But I'm not owed a decent salary in return for following my
| own dreams rather than my employer's dreams. Nobody is.
|
| Of course. On the other hand, one has to wonder which of this
| two occupations helps humanity more, and it's this the one
| that's paid better. And if not, should we rethink the way we
| reward work to prioritize things that help society instead.
| CuriouslyC wrote:
| In the age of precision psychological influence and constant
| bombardment with low grade mind control, Capitalism is trash.
| To the most rapacious, the loudest, the most insidious go the
| spoils. If we're gonna keep the current system we need to
| slam the ban hammer on advertising and marketing with
| righteous fury.
| nordsieck wrote:
| > should we rethink the way we reward work to prioritize
| things that help society instead.
|
| The problem is that everyone has different ideas about what
| helps society.
|
| At least the current system, where people are compensated
| based on supply and demand, people actually want what's being
| produced. In contrast to the old soviet system where top down
| production decisions mean that what's "best for society" is
| of no use to pretty much anyone except those people who
| needed to fill their quota.
| elashri wrote:
| Why do you pick the two extreme situations. Isn't there a
| possibility of a middle ground?
| robertlagrant wrote:
| The current system is not an extreme. Only concentrating
| power into the people who will pick what is good for
| society is extreme.
| elashri wrote:
| The extreme here is underpaying the professors and
| researchers so much in comparison with others (Like
| University and labs administrators)
| nordsieck wrote:
| > The extreme here is underpaying the professors and
| researchers so much
|
| The problem is not that those people are underpaid.
|
| The problem is the morass of regulation that prevents
| people building enough housing where they want to live,
| which keeps the cost of housing high.
|
| And look - I get it - most of that regulation is there
| for a reason: it's popular. People like it. People like
| having rent control, or limited increases in property
| taxes. People in single family houses like not having
| apartment buildings go up next door to them. People like
| seeing green space on office campuses. People like
| mandatory parking requirements for homes and businesses.
|
| But ultimately, a high cost of living is deeply corrosive
| to society, and all the little perks that come from these
| regulations just aren't worth it.
| MiguelX413 wrote:
| All forms of structuring society are "regulation".
| Capitalism doesn't exist without private property law.
| nordsieck wrote:
| > All forms of structuring society are "regulation"
|
| If you're going to count the emergent structure that
| forms from voluntary cooperation as "regulation", the
| word loses its meaning.
|
| > Capitalism doesn't exist without private property law.
|
| Sure it does.
|
| Laws aren't self-enforcing: the the thing that makes laws
| "real" is violence (or the threat of violence) backing
| them up.
|
| For those who are unable to avail themselves of remedies
| under the law - typically because they're engaging in
| illegal behavior - they can skip the law bit and move
| straight to violence.
|
| Basically every criminal organization or individual
| operates in this manner.
|
| I'm not saying it's nice to live this way - I very much
| like living in a place with a (mostly) functioning legal
| system. But Capitalism very much does exist without
| private property law.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Sounds like there is an excess supply of physicists and
| physics professors, so on the margin they are no help at all.
| ricksunny wrote:
| And then might the society be worse off for lacking the
| physics/scientific advancements by not supporting adequately an
| an individual to remain on the scientific path.
| petesergeant wrote:
| The end result of this is that only people who are
| independently wealthy or who can't make the private sector work
| for them end up as profs, which seems like a worse situation
| for society.
| Cheer2171 wrote:
| > I admire the guy for choosing to do more important work and
| making sacrifices to do it. But I'm not owed a decent salary in
| return for following my own dreams rather than my employer's
| dreams. Nobody is.
|
| Students at public universities deserve good instructors. Stop
| applying a capitalist market rationale to public services.
|
| Are you one of those people who thinks that whatever price the
| market offers for labor is axiomatically fair?
| robertlagrant wrote:
| > Stop applying a capitalist market rationale to public
| services.
|
| We're discussing wages. Wages are all about that rationale.
| If you make a choice you should abide by it.
|
| This is nothing to do with what students "deserve", whatever
| that means.
| medo-bear wrote:
| A lot of people always act tough until toughness comes to hit
| them in their face. People usually forget that we all live on
| the chopping board and it is a matter of high probability
| that eventually we all get some sort of chop.
| wesselbindt wrote:
| > But I'm not owed a decent salary in return for following my
| own dreams rather than my employer's dreams. Nobody is.
|
| Ok, but he is owed a decent salary for performing an important
| job. Without guys like this, we don't have a next generation of
| physicists (most of whom will move into the private sector).
| thierrydamiba wrote:
| I'm not exactly sure that's how the world works...
| medo-bear wrote:
| Im not sure you know how the world works
| idiotsecant wrote:
| It is if you want to continue educating new physicists.
|
| 'How the world works' is not set in stone. The current
| dysfunction of the academic system in the US (the world?)
| wasn't always this bad. We can educate the next generation,
| make scientific advancements, _and_ not have professors
| starve on the street to make that happen.
| serf wrote:
| less educators produce less educated, that's absolutely how
| it works.
|
| the incentives, the logistics and finances of how we get to
| a point like that -- well that's where it gets muddier.
| elevation wrote:
| The worry is that by better funding educators we might
| have to make do with less administrators, which could
| leave students less administrated.
| david38 wrote:
| No it isn't. You're implying education = higher standard
| of living, more jobs. It doesn't.
|
| One man can make a video lesson and teach millions, so
| more educators doesn't mean more educated.
|
| You can change the teacher:student ratio and still
| improve the number of educated. If you think this is
| false, then anything beyond 1:1 tutors is bad. Yet UCLA
| doesn't operate on 1:1 ratios.
|
| Finally, what makes you think there will be less
| educators? Very likely UCLA can rely on the rich and
| nerdy people who are willing to subsidize their own
| careers. This already happens in many fields.
|
| Really finally, this is a shit practice. I'd like to see
| an audit of where the money goes such that the most
| student focused educators become last in line to get
| paid.
| Volundr wrote:
| > You can change the teacher:student ratio and still
| improve the number of educated. If you think this is
| false, then anything beyond 1:1 tutors is bad.
|
| A here does not imply B. If it did then the natural
| conclusion is that the world only needs one singular
| educator.
|
| In reality there's a sliding scale where more students to
| a given educator results in lower quality education, but
| a greater number of educated. The art is balancing these
| concerns.
| HPsquared wrote:
| It's possible to devote too much time and energy to
| education, i.e. diminishing returns.
|
| Academia is, in essence, a multi-level marketing scheme
| that produces more of itself, and will (if given
| unlimited resources from other areas of society) expand
| until it takes all resources simply replicating more of
| itself.
|
| Many poor countries have enormously bloated education
| sectors.
| lolinder wrote:
| > Without guys like this, we don't have a next generation of
| physicists (most of whom will move into the private sector).
|
| There are plenty of people who would be totally happy to step
| into this professor's shoes at his current rate of pay just
| to have a position in academia. We have _too many_ PhDs--
| there are more people who want a position in academia than
| academia can support.
|
| We're not faced with the prospect of not being able to train
| a next generation of physicists, but there's a real
| possibility that the next generation doesn't view academia as
| the ideal place to be--the physics equivalent of Broadway. If
| that happens, fewer people will put up with low-valued
| positions and a dangled tenure carrot, and the college job
| market will adapt.
|
| In the meantime we're not going to solve the problem of
| academic jobs being overvalued by the workforce by
| artificially inflating pay for the lucky few who landed an
| academic job at all.
| beachtaxidriver wrote:
| Amen. If the net present value and risk of being a professor
| paid as well as dealing with corporate B.S. I know which I
| would do...
| oysterville wrote:
| I'm of the mind that if we had the best in the field educating
| the next generations and compensated them well that we would
| end up with better qualified graduates. It seems like this
| would be the result at all levels of education, really.
|
| In America we are doing the opposite, and then wondering why
| the results are sub optimal.
| salawat wrote:
| >But I'm not owed a decent salary in return for following my
| own dreams rather than my employer's dreams. Nobody is.
|
| Why should that employer's dreams take primacy over anyone
| elses?
|
| The answer: there isn't a reason why. All semblance of economic
| activity is based on a fiction. That fiction has been guided to
| structurally elevate a subset of people's wishes and
| motivations over everyone else's, including yours. And you're
| totally okay with that state of affairs. Useful idiot much?
|
| Can at least applaud the guy for sticking to his principles.
| Sometimes society needs a good nut kick to realize it's
| destroying itself. That it collectively takes so many ruined
| lives to do so is the true tragedy of our times.
| andrewmcwatters wrote:
| Man with highly educated background ignores basic economic
| situation that also affects millions of other people.
|
| Slow news day.
| sameoldtune wrote:
| I expect professors to be homeless too.
| lainga wrote:
| What solution do you propose? No more UCLA?
| Muromec wrote:
| He can grow potatoes and sale contraband wares at the illegal
| market or immigrate to US and find a good paying job there.
| Oh wait, I though it was about 90ies in here places again.
| winter_blue wrote:
| You mean an artificial economic situation that NIMBYs have
| created by making it nearly impossible to build new homes.
|
| It's not a fair situation from any perspective. NIMBYs are
| slowly destroying California's heart, and turning it into a
| place where only people with a 100k+ (and soon 200k+) income
| can afford a home.
| andrewmcwatters wrote:
| Then leave.
| egypturnash wrote:
| alternatively:
|
| this basic economic situation has gotten so fucked up that even
| a traditionally solid middle-class gig like "professor at
| moderately prestigious university" can't pay his bills
| avg_dev wrote:
| yes, this. as others have pointed out: of course it is
| (understatedly) terrible that so many people who work various
| types of jobs cannot pay their bills. all that i see
| happening here is that the low income bar for being able to
| survive and live a decent life is getting higher and higher;
| it is not that there are not many others who also should be
| able to live a decent life.
|
| (and yes, i do understand the difference between a lecturer
| and a professor, and i do understand about roommates, and i
| do understand about living in a cheaper cost-of-living area.
| i think these are all reasonable points. but i still think
| that it would be nice if someone could live a good life a
| distance from work that doesn't make their commute an
| absolute dread and still be able to afford basic things. yes,
| i believe everyone deserves this, no matter what type of work
| that they do. no, i don't think that's the direction we are
| currently headed.)
| readingnews wrote:
| I am no astrophysicist, but he notes: "Hi
| everyone, my name is Daniel, and I'm an astrophysics professor at
| UCLA. I'm only being paid $70,000 for this academic year,"
| McKeown says in the video. McKeown, listed as a
| lecturer on UCLA's website, says he had to move out of his
| apartment because he could no longer afford the rent.
| McKeown says his rent was $2,500 a month. According to RentCafe,
| the average rent is $3,700 in Westwood.
|
| Hrm, I have no idea what his actual situation or bills are. But
| 70k is not chump change, and 2.5k rent seems "manageable". Lets
| see, if his is single, that puts tax at 22%. It is probably 30%
| with state and local, minus SS tax. Lets kick it up to 36%.
|
| (70000-(70000*0.36))/12.0=3733.33
|
| Ok he is left with 3733.33-2500=1233.33 a month, that is BRUTAL,
| but I know people that live on less than that after a home
| mortgage and car note.
|
| Again, I have no idea of his situation. Maybe student loans,
| maybe a car note, medical expenses, etc, but to state out loud
| that you have probably 1.2k a month after rent and can not
| possibly live without _a hundred grand_ extra (what he is trying
| to raise... which is EIGHT THOUSAND A MONTH EXTRA) seems a bit, I
| am not sure, overreacting? I am just conflicted about this story.
| I have really good friends that would do a hulluva lot for a 70k
| job with a 2.5k rent, but at the same time, it is true we are
| paying professors (and educators in general) far too little.
|
| Is this just to make a statement maybe?
| cute_boi wrote:
| You haven't done anything extra like insurance, mobile bills,
| other loans etc... which is also costly.
|
| If he is married, has obligations to support parents, you are
| out of luck.
| jcranmer wrote:
| > If he is married
|
| If he is married, then his spouse (especially given the
| marital demographics of people holding advanced degrees) is
| quite likely also contributing income, and decently likely to
| be contributing income at least as much as he is. Now married
| _with kids_ is a different ballgame, but married per se isn
| 't going to be a financial burden.
| mistrial9 wrote:
| his taxes in total are more than thirty six percent in
| California, and there is no mention of debt service costs.
| rconti wrote:
| I posted the smartasset tax calculator link in this thread
| but the upshot is his state taxes should be a bit over 4%
| effective, or about $3k.
|
| Total effective tax burden (federal, fica, plus CA) on this
| pay amount for a single person with no other circumstances is
| just shy of 23%.
| wesselbindt wrote:
| Going from "I don't know this guy's situation" to "This guy is
| just making a statement" is a pretty big leap.
| jncfhnb wrote:
| He is asking for 100k, not 100k extra.
|
| Factor in state and local taxes, utilities, necessary expenses,
| transportation, etc. it seems fully believable that he is
| paycheck to paycheck which gradually boils down to debt when
| life rolls a 1 and you have to pay $500 to fix something.
| rconti wrote:
| The linked article quotes him: "I'm asking for $100,000 so I
| can afford my rent".
|
| I take that to mean $100k total, which is $2500 pre-tax.
|
| I suspect his effective tax rate is significantly below your
| numbers. 22% may be the marginal federal tax rate on $70k (I
| didn't check), but that would probably put his effective
| federal rate in the low teens.
|
| EDIT: just checked, just below 11% according to this SmartAsset
| calculator which puts take-home just shy of $54k or $4500 a
| month. Only if he has ZERO other obligations like child support
| or student loans.
|
| https://smartasset.com/taxes/income-taxes#DV9x0OBRA9
| mistersquid wrote:
| McKeown should be paid more, without question, but he is a
| lecturer, not a faculty member. His title and appointment is not
| as a "Professor". [0]
|
| This is due to the hierarchical ranking system of academic
| institutions. McKeown's qualifications may be the same as his
| more highly ranked colleagues, but the tiered system which
| rewards research does not pay as much for lecturers whose primary
| assignment is to teach.
|
| [0]
| https://www.pa.ucla.edu/lecturers.html#:~:text=physics.ucla....
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Yes, lecturer is a low level academic position, using the word
| "professor" to describe him is inaccurate, even though he has a
| Ph.D. If he is teaching one class, it likely isn't even a full-
| time position.
|
| Academics are also typically paid a 10-month salary (the
| "academic year" he mentions), if they teach summer classes that
| is separate "summer pay." At research universities, part of a
| professor's salary is also funded by research grant awards they
| win.
| rconti wrote:
| It's in the article. 6 classes a year, so presumably a 3/3.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Thanks, I did miss that.
| mistersquid wrote:
| > It's in the article. 6 classes a year, so presumably a
| 3/3.
|
| UCLA is on a quarter system, so maybe 2/2/2.
| BobaFloutist wrote:
| I mean, yeah, that's kind of the problem.
| beezle wrote:
| Per smartasset.com:
|
| 70K salary in Los Angeles - Gross $5,833/mo, filing single,
| including federal, state, fica, state disability gives a monthly
| take home of $4,447
|
| So find it hard to believe he is "homeless", seems to be more by
| choice. And if the take home after paying rent is still too high,
| do like most others do - get a roommate to share expenses.
| 65 wrote:
| Yeah, seems obvious getting a roommate would be the answer
| here. I'm not sure if that's not as culturally acceptable in LA
| as here in NYC but there are people in their 40s and beyond who
| have roommates.
| alephnerd wrote:
| It's culturally acceptable to get a roommate in LA -
| especially to live in a neighborhood like Westwood.
|
| Furthermore, he could live 20 minutes away in another
| neighborhood instead of Westwood - which is LA's version of
| Lower East Side in NYC - and get a 1bdrm for $1800-2400.
|
| This is truly out of touch, because so many Los Angelenos
| have a combined household income at or below $70,000 yet are
| able to raise families and live a middle class life in LA.
|
| This does not mean that lecturer pay shouldn't be increased -
| lecturers in humanities fields at UCLA get paid WAAAAY worse
| than $70k, and would fight to get that kind of a salary
| alone.
| jncfhnb wrote:
| This comic has sat in my head for a long time: https://www.smbc-
| comics.com/comic/college-level-mathematics
|
| It's now outdated, and the numbers are worse
| flatline wrote:
| Academia is exploitative. The financial incentives are a symptom
| of the bigger problem. Is university career training for industry
| or for an academic track? It is not made clear to people entering
| the system, and is often murky to everyone years into a degree.
| There is encouragement for education for its own sake, there's
| encouragement for education for a high paying career, and there's
| encouragement to merge these two and enter academia in a
| professional capacity. There's often a mountain of
| undischargeable personal debt behind it.
|
| What people are typically not told is that financially stable
| academic positions are either political or hard to come by. It's
| like professional sports: you can be a pro and just short of top
| notch and you'll be playing in the minors for your career, making
| pennies. This could take the form of endless low-paying
| postdoctoral gigs, or the crown prize, an associate professorship
| with little or no benefits and a salary that just lets you scrape
| by.
|
| In the meantime you are expected to pour your heart and soul into
| the endeavor. There is some reward in that but it is fleeting,
| and once you have committed to a career path the momentum to
| change tracks can be a real obstacle. Academia will suck you dry
| and demand more. Unless you end up with a tenured position at the
| end of that, it's not sustainable unless you have another source
| of financial backing, like a spouse with a "real job."
|
| The US doesn't really value education. Those who do are
| idealistic or exploitative, sometimes both. You're buying into a
| deeply dysfunctional system and should at least go into it with
| eyes open.
| qeternity wrote:
| > Academia is exploitative.
|
| As another commenter noted, this person could likely easily go
| into the private sector and earn multiples of their salary.
| Also $70k is smack on for median salaries in LA. This person
| chooses to work in academia. He is not being exploited.
| Presumably he finds it more fulfilling to do what he does
| currently. And good for him. But that's a luxury. Nothing in
| life guarantees your dream job and your dream salary.
| catchcatchcatch wrote:
| He can get another job most scientists need to stock shelves or
| something puts their phd in perspective
| oatmeal1 wrote:
| Low pay isn't the problem. There's nowhere $70k shouldn't enable
| you to afford rent. Setback requirements, and single use & single
| family zoning are the problem.
| alephnerd wrote:
| > There's nowhere $70k shouldn't enable you to afford rent
|
| You can afford to rent a 1 bedroom on a $70k salary in Los
| Angeles - not in Westwood (the bougie neighborhood that UCLA is
| located in), but take the 405 and commute from the Valley.
| rdudek wrote:
| Wonder how much UCLA administrators get paid compared to faculty?
| dekhn wrote:
| All of UC's pay is online at
| https://ucannualwage.ucop.edu/wage/ If you search for
| administrator (although dean might be a better term?) you will
| see folks like the head of the Hammer Musuem, which is
| affiliated with UCLA, makes gross $437K. Her job title is
| Academic Administrator VII (the highest level in that job
| type). Similarly, the Dean for UC Extension (basically a night-
| school for UC) makes a similar salary. Other Academic
| Administrator VII make "much less"- all the way down to $26K or
| even $0.
|
| As an anecdote, let me explain how the game is played. I had
| two different postdoc advisors at Berkeley. Both were tenure-
| track professors with good publication records. The first one
| negotiated her own startup package (starting professors get lab
| money and lab space to get started) and ended up with a small
| collection of rooms (3) on a crowded floor, with terrible IT
| infra. She eventually convinced the facilities manager to give
| her an IT room (nothing quite like watching your advisor waggle
| her body to get space) and eventually got tenure- 12 years
| after starting. The second advisor brought a lawyer to his
| negotiation and secured a full lab space with promises of more,
| a $1+M startup fund, and a number of other key concessions; he
| got tenure in 5 more years. The first professor said it was
| "unseemly" that the second professor had brought a negotiator-
| but the reality is that the Deans who act as the university
| representative are quite knowledgeable and seek to bring on
| faculty for the lowest prices, while paying themselves the
| excess.
| robertlagrant wrote:
| How is he homeless? Can someone break down where that 70k goes?
| It's about $5.8k/month gross.
| linguae wrote:
| As someone who recently left an industry job to teach full-time
| at a community college, I have mixed feelings about the situation
| of this physics lecturer. I don't want to dismiss the
| difficulties that many people, including academics, face in the
| housing market. In places like Los Angeles and Silicon Valley
| it's rough for those having to pay market rates for housing
| unless they have extremely high incomes.
|
| However, I feel that the lecturer, who started his position at
| UCLA last year, didn't do enough homework regarding academic
| salaries. $70,000 for a non-tenured lecturer is normal, maybe
| above average, and in fact there are many tenure-track assistant
| professors who make about the same. To add, UCLA is in a very
| expensive area. He will have to compete against well-heeled
| people who want to live within close proximity to some of the
| nation's wealthiest areas, such as Santa Monica and Beverly
| Hills. A physics lecturer simply can't compete against Hollywood.
|
| In addition, a $70,000 annual salary means that he could qualify
| for a rental no more than $1944 per month due to the standard 3x
| the rent requirement a lot of California landlords have. A
| cursory search on Craigslist shows plenty of one-bedroom
| apartments in Los Angeles County that are within this budget.
| Granted, they may not be the nicest complexes in the nicest
| neighborhoods, and they may require a commute, but the Los
| Angeles metro area does have extensive public transportation, and
| nobody goes into academia expecting a luxurious lifestyle on an
| academic salary. An academic who wants to make serious money
| needs to take advantage of entrepreneurial opportunities outside
| the institution.
|
| In addition, there are plenty of grad students and postdocs
| making less than $70,000 who attend schools like UCLA that are in
| very expensive areas. Once again, I don't want to dismiss the
| challenges they have. I myself lived in Santa Cruz County for
| over a decade and I know firsthand the challenge of being a grad
| student at UC Santa Cruz dealing with the area's notoriously
| difficult housing market.
|
| But I have a feeling we're being withheld useful information
| about his finances. Does he have massive student loans impacting
| his budget? Does he have other obligations such as taking care of
| family members? Why wasn't he able to take advantage of UCLA's
| faculty housing?
|
| I just feel that this guy didn't do enough homework about the
| realities of being an academic, especially one living in a very
| expensive area. I'm an academic in Silicon Valley and I'm fully
| aware of the tradeoffs of choosing this lifestyle over industry.
| Yes, I'd like a bigger home closer to work, and I have no idea
| how I'd raise a family (though I'm single now so I don't need to
| worry). But at the same time I enjoy the freedom I have in
| academia; I have far more research freedom as a community college
| instructor than I did as an industry researcher. I also love
| teaching and guiding students.
| alephnerd wrote:
| Yeah, I think this article does a massive disservice to the
| issue of low pay for contract faculty and postdocs by
| highlighting the relative out-of-touchness of McKeown while
| ignoring how a lot of lecturers and post-docs (at UCs like UCLA
| as well as other institutions) earn well below $70k depending
| on the field.
|
| > Why wasn't he able to take advantage of UCLA's faculty
| housing
|
| Lecturers are at the lowest priority for UCLA Faculty Housing.
|
| That said, you can afford a 1bdrm on $70k in LA, just not in
| Westwood. He'd have to commute from the Valley if he wants to
| pay less than $2500/mo.
| OutOfHere wrote:
| He should get the message that they don't need him there. He
| should quit and get a real job in industry that pays 100-200k. It
| may require him to move, but not be homeless.
| FfejL wrote:
| "Technically, I am homeless. I do not have a place of my own. I'm
| not on any lease," he says.
|
| That is not 'technically' homeless, or any other kind of
| homeless. If it was, millions of adults who move back home with
| their parents would be 'homeless.' Millions of spouses who aren't
| on the lease or deed would be 'homeless.' Millions of roommates,
| too -- which is, in fact, what this guy actually is.
|
| I sympathize that the guy is in a tough spot, $70k a year is not
| a lot to live on in LA. But this kind of self-victimization is
| not helpful, Professor.
| dekhn wrote:
| For some reason his videos keep showing up when I watch Youtube
| Shorts even after I've clicked the various buttons which should
| suppress them. At some point, people started pointing out the
| problems in his argument, and he'd... post trolling videos with
| him responding. And the videos are just static snapshots of
| twitter exchanges.
|
| Any sympathy I had for him disappeared when he started attacking
| folks making good points.
| vinni2 wrote:
| It says he is a lecturer. Unfortunately lecturers are not well
| payed. My understanding is lecturers only teach and don't bring
| in research grants. Tenured professors are a different story.
| tzs wrote:
| Maybe universities should provide housing for the lower paid
| teaching staff. In the case of UCLA they have on-campus housing
| and nearby UCLA-owned apartments for about 13000 people. Let's
| say they expanded that by 5%. That would be housing for 650
| people.
|
| They have around 5500 faculty members and 31000 staff members
| (although both of these numbers vary quite a bit from source to
| source), but many of the faculty are in research positions not
| teaching positions.
|
| UCLA is usually reports to have a student to teacher ration of
| around 19:1 and around 45000 students, which would suggest about
| 2400 teachers, so my proposed 5% housing expansion would let them
| offer housing to about 1/4 of the teachers.
|
| It would probably have be high density housing, much like typical
| undergraduate housing, but that should be fine. All the people in
| it would be doing very similar jobs, likely on very similar
| schedules, and with similar requirements for their home
| environment. The more similar you are to your neighbors the
| higher density can go before people want to start killing each
| other.
| codekisser wrote:
| My university's dorms suffered from no AC, black mold,
| cockroaches, and yearly floods. I couldn't imagine if teachers
| and TAs had to live in such slums in addition to being given
| such inadequate pay. Providing housing is just treating a
| symptom - universities should fix this by paying their staff
| enough so they can even afford rent.
| rahimnathwani wrote:
| Here is another perspective, for balance:
|
| https://x.com/DrBrianKeating/status/1845528361013231808
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