Structural issues including cross subsidy in higher ed.

More structural issues in higher-ed that appear hard to change (see previous post). From Science:

Unfortunately, it is not clear why Ph.D. students pursue postdoc positions and how their plans depend on individual-level factors, such as career goals or labor market perceptions.

And in Nature

The number of US faculty members who have tenure or are on the tenure track is falling, according to a report by the American Association of University Professors in Washington DC. Over the past 40 years, the proportion of the academic labour force that is in a full-time tenured position has shrunk by one-quarter, and the proportion in tenure-track posts has halved, reports Higher Education at a Crossroads.

Across large swathes of higher ed there is an enormous amount of cross-subsidy, much of it based on misinformation about ‘what you are buying’. Tech and data will start to unpick at much of this. The future for many institutions is uncertain.