Yup, Neo-liberal or full blown Nuremberg. Easy choice but we’re still getting fucked. We need ranked choice voting and proportional representation but how do you get our parliament to vote through a resolution that endangers a lot of their safe seats.

We were so close with Trudeau. He was elected entirely on the back of that promise and everyone knew it. All we had to do was hold his feet to the fire when he tried to weasel out of it after getting the majority that left him no reasonable excuse for not following through. But we all know what happened. He later even said his biggest regret was not following through on electoral reform. Well, yeah. I’m not sure I believe him, but if he’s telling the truth I hope it fucking haunts him. It should. I’ll certainly never forgive him.

1. No public institutions in Canada pay the pensions of people employed there. The pension funds are user contributed and the mandatory contributions allow no RESP savings.

2. Many departments between education and research have budgets exceeding $100M/yr…you want to put that in the hands of anyone making under $250K? Good luck.

Back to the National Post comment section with you.

Got that right. The head of our local college was making $400,000 a year before he retired. This is a small town college not a university, and that kind of income is ridiculously high for a college president in a town of 60,000. Thats double what our premier makes.

On the other hand, I did a little digging and compared to other English speaking nation universities, Canada is actually bottom of the list for paying our university presidents: https://higheredstrategy.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Figure-6.png

Okay, right after you explain why Real Estate agents are millionaires.

Are we now acting like universities are poor and aren’t gouging the fuck out of everyone?

Perhaps if you had of attended either institution, you wouldn’t make comments like that one.

The federal and provincial governments have been underfunding universities for decades. Recently, universities were able to start recruiting foreign students to make up for the shortfall, but it looks like that money tap will be turned down. It doesn’t look like there’s a plan to make up for it.

At the same time, the feds want to

recruit more than 1,000 top international researchers to Canada, with the budget injecting up to $1.7-billion into a suite of recruitment measures.

That’ll be tough if universities see their income crater.

projection

Isn’t growing universities a good thing? It seems to me that giving everyone access to a university education would be highly beneficial to the people.

I watched my local college lose all its credibility as a result of running borderline scams for foreign students. My old university otoh has been rather smart about not becoming too dependent on foriegn student tuition. I love immigration, and especially think exporting our education is a good thing, but the way these programs have been run in recent years is a cancer on these institutions and pure short term thinking. I’d rather see reform, but this is almost as good.

Tuition costs have been capped for the last 8 years in Ontario. Is everyone just pulling numbers out of their asses?

They’re not, really. Their expenses have gone up to match. The days of just teaching with just blackboards are over.

If all expenses are necessary is another question, though. Someone mentioned administration bloat.

WTF are you even talking about?

Universities have grown way beyond what they need to for the domestic student population. This is growth squarely aimed at international students who pay 5-10x what domestic students pay in tuition. Cut off the tap of international students and you end up with huge unused capacity and budget shortfalls.

I’d rather see reform, but this is almost as good.

Actual reform would be the way to go.

UofT appears to have done a good job of keeping their books balanced, despite the glut of foreign students, but many others have not.

There is too much bloat. I’ve seen first hand essentially glorified admins being paid $130k + full pension. They need to trim the fat at these places and restructure operations to get rid of all the waste.

Okay, right after you explain why Real Estate agents are millionaires.

The federal and provincial governments have been underfunding universities for decades. Recently, universities were able to start recruiting foreign students to make up for the shortfall, but it looks like that money tap will be turned down. It doesn’t look like there’s a plan to make up for it.

At the same time, the feds want to

recruit more than 1,000 top international researchers to Canada, with the budget injecting up to $1.7-billion into a suite of recruitment measures.

That’ll be tough if universities see their income crater.

Unless its more than free that’s not affordable to most