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Comment by jimbob45 | Hacker News Reader

This is the primary drawback of unions, no? The most talented workers leave to self-negotiate better salaries elsewhere and the company can’t do anything about it.

At least that’s what I got from the article. Weird for a university professor to blame a union.

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I don’t think universities care whether their adjuncts are the most talented. Basically the entire point of the role these days is to undercut the cost of getting tenured faculty to teach classes. Given that backdrop I was honestly surprised to see the salary was as high as it was

That is almost certainly the union's doing. Unions help push back against the downward pressure on wages from employers (who are passing on the downard pressure from investors and the public).

The same thing happens at the vast majority of US universities whose faculty aren’t unionized. In fact, per [0], the two thirds of adjuncts make under $50,000 which is less than half what the union negotiated.

[0]: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/04/20/new-report-sa...

OK, but roughly 100% of the US has lower living costs than Berkeley too. $50,000 (especially with solid benefits) is a middle-class salary in most places.

Without union, i can nearly guarantee she will earn less, work more and probably have no health benefits

The salary is as high as it is in part due to the Union -- but the UC starting salary for lecturers regardless of discipline and location is around $60K. But computer science is in a roughly better position because a few tenured faculty advocated for higher wages so they could actually make hires. Still multiple people are leaving because the workload/stress/salary are out of alignment.

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