State support for higher ed expected to increase

[mahagonny]

How would this help students and/or faculty?

What does this have to do with anything? Your figures are wrong. It's about 25% of states where public employees don't pay into Social Security. In some of those states, higher ed employees do have FICA withheld.

No. I meant that in those states where public employees do not pay social security tax, mine for instance, the employer also does not match it. That's why I would rather see the private colleges get the funding.

What does this have to do with anything? Your figures are wrong. It's about 25% of states where public employees don't pay into Social Security. In some of those states, higher ed employees do have FICA withheld.

Yup. State employees need not pay social security taxes if and only if the State has an at least comparable retirement program. Social security by another name.

Social security is the better deal. It goes on for as long as you live. The retirement programs are a finite sum.

Adjunct faculty need and deserve social security benefits.

How would it help students? I'm not prepared at this time to show how with data. I guess my argument is adjunct faculty are people too. And you have nothing to worry about, because that argument never works.

[dismalist]

Adjunct faculty need and deserve social security benefits.

They pay for it and receive it either through the Feds or through their State.

[Mobius]

I've been an adjunct for a state university where faculty did not pay FICA. Part of my check goes into a retirement plan. Unfortunately, career adjuncts aren't going to make much either through social security or a state retirement plan.

Again, I don't see how this has anything to do with state support for higher ed. Even a state like Arkansas has its problems (e.g. Henderson State) where a little extra money won't fix glaring financial issues.

[mahagonny]

I've been an adjunct for a state university where faculty did not pay FICA. Part of my check goes into a retirement plan. Unfortunately, career adjuncts aren't going to make much either through social security or a state retirement plan.

Again, I don't see how this has anything to do with state support for higher ed. Even a state like Arkansas has its problems (e.g. Henderson State) where a little extra money won't fix glaring financial issues.

It has to do with why boosting enrollment at the state university is another kick in the nuts to adjunct faculty. Let the students attend the private schools, the ones that are not exempt from the FICA tax matching.
I don't expect anyone here to care. I'm surprised I got a response at all, actually.

Some big bucks may flow in New York, where the governor wants to raise enrollment in the public university system from 376,000 to 500,000. That increase may cost some of the (too?) many other schools in the region enrollment.

Eh, I'd be happier to see the competing schools get the enrollment. SUNY has a poor reputation for its treatment of faculty.

[apl68]

I've been an adjunct for a state university where faculty did not pay FICA. Part of my check goes into a retirement plan. Unfortunately, career adjuncts aren't going to make much either through social security or a state retirement plan.

Again, I don't see how this has anything to do with state support for higher ed. Even a state like Arkansas has its problems (e.g. Henderson State) where a little extra money won't fix glaring financial issues.

Speaking of which, Chancellor Ambrose has had this to say:

Nearly half of Henderson State students, or about 47%, who enrolled since 2016 "are no longer with us at all," Ambrose said, meaning they are not registered to attend classes nor have they earned their degrees.

"Here's the daunting figure that drives us basically to exigency," Ambrose said. "Of the $10 million that students owe us in student receivables, that 47% of students who are not longer here account for nearly $7 million of unpaid student accounts."

He said the unpaid student accounts are "dictated" by the loss of students who didn't continue their studies, and he said that of those students, "close to 70% have not paid their bills.

https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2022/feb/11/henderson-state-university-proposes-timeline-for/


Given this, and declines in enrollment in recent years that seem unlikely to be reversed, it looks like they are indeed going to have to cut whole programs.

[Mobius]

I've been an adjunct for a state university where faculty did not pay FICA. Part of my check goes into a retirement plan. Unfortunately, career adjuncts aren't going to make much either through social security or a state retirement plan.

Again, I don't see how this has anything to do with state support for higher ed. Even a state like Arkansas has its problems (e.g. Henderson State) where a little extra money won't fix glaring financial issues.

It has to do with why boosting enrollment at the state university is another kick in the nuts to adjunct faculty. Let the students attend the private schools, the ones that are not exempt from the FICA tax matching.
I don't expect anyone here to care. I'm surprised I got a response at all, actually.

Some big bucks may flow in New York, where the governor wants to raise enrollment in the public university system from 376,000 to 500,000. That increase may cost some of the (too?) many other schools in the region enrollment.

Eh, I'd be happier to see the competing schools get the enrollment. SUNY has a poor reputation for its treatment of faculty.

So saddle them with more debt so adjuncts have a class? To be honest, if this led to adjuncts who treat it as a career being cut, it would be better for them in the long run.

[mahagonny]

To be honest, if this led to adjuncts who treat it as a career being cut, it would be better for them in the long run.

Define 'treating it as a career' please. I would be interested in hearing what useful thing you think your refer to, although I am prepared to be disappointed.

I have had multiple streams of income for many years. It works. All of them together are a career.

[Mobius]

Someone like Margaret Mary Vojtko or Sue Bergin (came across her story this week).

[mahagonny]

Well, screw them and screw all adjunct faculty then.

[Mobius]

I still don't get the fixation on FICA. Adjuncts at state schools would pay into the state retirement system or an ORP.

[mahagonny]

I still don't get the fixation on FICA. Adjuncts at state schools would pay into the state retirement system or an ORP.

'Optional Retirement Program.' A misnomer. It's the employer's option, because it's practically cost-free for them. The employee has no choice.

There's no fixation. There's a discussion about people you don't care about.

[ciao_yall]

I still don't get the fixation on FICA. Adjuncts at state schools would pay into the state retirement system or an ORP.

'Optional Retirement Program.' A misnomer. It's the employer's option, because it's practically cost-free for them. The employee has no choice.

There's no fixation. There's a discussion about people you don't care about.

It actually costs our employer much more to put into the state retirement system than Social Security.

[apl68]

I still don't get the fixation on FICA. Adjuncts at state schools would pay into the state retirement system or an ORP.

'Optional Retirement Program.' A misnomer. It's the employer's option, because it's practically cost-free for them. The employee has no choice.

There's no fixation. There's a discussion about people you don't care about.

It actually costs our employer much more to put into the state retirement system than Social Security.

We have to pay into both.  We hold out the usual SS and matching contributions, and full-time staff members pay into the state's retirement program, with an employer contribution.  It's a pretty substantial chunk.  However, our state has one of the nation's more solvent state pension funds as a result.

[Mobius]

I still don't get the fixation on FICA. Adjuncts at state schools would pay into the state retirement system or an ORP.

'Optional Retirement Program.' A misnomer. It's the employer's option, because it's practically cost-free for them. The employee has no choice.

There's no fixation. There's a discussion about people you don't care about.

Do you know what an ORP is? I had a choice when I started adjuncting for this one school. A % of my pay goes into an account and it is matched by the university. Again, you're fixated on this but it doesn't have much practical effect.

Explain, again, how this affects adjuncts if they have to pay into a retirement system that would provide similar benefits for Social Security?

[mahagonny]

They're not the same in all states. Ours is just forced savings. No employer contribution.