Wall Street has consolidated into 5 giant banks. Airlines have merged from 12 carriers in 1980 to 4 today. A handful of drug companies control the pharmaceutical industry. Four giants control over 80% of meat processing. The evidence of corporate concentration is everywhere.

That’s my experience too Rob. They pay for their credential and undertake it to get a job or a better job. It’s transactional. It’s no longer about learning, thinking, developing…

Thanks for being there Rick (and others as you point out). It’s a disgraceful chapter and we need to hear the hideous detail of it.

Tomorrow we're meeting to escalate our bargaining campaign at Monash - we want to see all Monash members in the room. It's been 221 days since our agreement expired and the VC has earned $726,427 while we wait for a pay offer. See you on Zoom at 12pm tomorrow (Tuesday).

Some uni students I teach, told me the decline happens at 50yrs. It’s a fact they said that you can’t learn anything new after 50. Phew, lucky I finished my PhD at age 50 then!

Thanks for the citations, Rob. This sort of simplistic thinking seems to be ubiquitous. I’m always looking for evidence to counter it.

Banned? Surely that’s not true. I’ve read all of them and we studied Huck Finn in school in Aust. 😳

There is so much written about leadership, but so little to link any research on leadership to outcomes

"Serious governance problems across the university sector" Fair work ombudsman describing Australian #universities at Senate Estimates on Wednesday. Watch the video of Fair Work Ombudsman officials speaking to @senator_sheldon here: nteu.au/News_Articles/… #betterunis #highered

You can tell immediately it is plagiarized because item 2 speaks to investing in staff and providing them with the resources they need 😂 Deakin Uni Casuals in Solidarity Monash Casuals Network La Trobe University Casuals Network

I have been a casual academic for 16yrs. This has occurred for me from my first contract, at each university for which I worked. Each time, I went to the union: they told me there was nothing they could do. Fairwork is taking it up because the NTEU never did.

16 yrs ago Alison Barnes I asked the NTEU to help me with wage theft and corrupt hiring practices. I was told ‘there is nothing we can do’. NTEU has known about this for decades and done nothing Deakin Uni Casuals in Solidarity La Trobe University Casuals Network Monash Casuals Network

I raised it again as an LTU casual NTEU member a few years later. Got no help again. In fact, I was told that the union does not support casualisation of the workforce, so they can’t help. Even though they took my union dues. I am no longer a union member 😏

Great example of how well democracy works inside capitalism!

What’s the good news?

I’ve been a casual academic across 4 universities for 16 yrs. The under payment is deliberate & systemic and the NTEU has turned a blind eye to it the whole time.

Really this is laughable. Craig Laughton says it’s not deliberate wage theft it’s just really complicated to pay correctly & the NTEU now says more needs to be done. Where was the NTEU when I asked for help with wage theft? They took my money as a union member and did nothing

Good position for judgement but not as warm as a keyboard!

Really thoughtful article about the place and purpose of universities historically and now

As unions have weakened, inequality has widened. The share of national income going to the richest 10% was lowest (and share to the bottom 90% highest) when union membership was high. This is why the UAW victory in Tennessee is a big deal. We must build back union power.