I am actually ok with high pay for star professors. If you're a Nobel and bring international esteem to the school, you deserve to get paid. If your lectures are beamed around the world in MOOCs, you deserve to get paid.
I think many tenured professors don't deserve it, and schools have very bloated administrations. They also have mispriced priorities. (Subsidizing luxury dorms, athletic facilities, etc)
I agree that top researchers should be paid well by someone, I just don't think we've got the right someones.
No man, or organization, can serve two masters. Either these schools are about undergraduate education or they aren't. The counterargument about presige isn't completly wrong. Prestige of the school is valuable to a degree holder. But all the universities chasing after the same limited pool of prestige is socially wasteful, and these heavily tax subsidized institutions are supposed to be advancing the social interest.
We should have separate institutions that do research and perhaps train grad students.
Either these schools are about undergraduate education or they aren't.
They aren't. When has this ever been a question? That doesn't change the fact that starry-eyed undegrads want to bask in the light of famous members of their field.
Imagine Feynman was still teaching, but was terrible at it. Would that stop countless people scrambling to get into the university he teaches at, simply to get exposure to his prowess and dream of working in his lab?
Research universities are a natural place for undergraduates. It's a symbiotic relationship. The University has use for willing young minds and hands, and willing young minds flock to the places where the knowledge is.
P.S. Don't forget star professors are often stars because of how much funding they bring to the university. It's not like undergrads are bearing the brunt of funding their laboratories.
I hear you. In a sense you could argue the liberal arts and community colleges do focus on undergrads, and the research schools take undergrads and professional programs along for the ride to pay the bills. In that case undergrads who subsidize faculty who are only concerned about producing Phds are knowing participants. But even still, the liberal arts schools (say Amherst) shouldn't be 20x the cost of the community colleges.
I think many tenured professors don't deserve it, and schools have very bloated administrations. They also have mispriced priorities. (Subsidizing luxury dorms, athletic facilities, etc)