Recent moves by adjunct professors to unionize at Duke University, the University of Chicago and the University of Minnesota are heightening a debate over how much such steps will cost schools and whether the moves could radically shrink the jobs available to the low-level professors. A recent study found that U.S. universities’ costs could increase to a total of $24 billion from $4.3 billion for courses currently taught by adjuncts, if union targets for higher pay are met, according to a paper co-authored by Georgetown University business school professor Jason Brennan. In addition, the consolidation of courses to provide “good jobs,” meaning a full-time courseload and benefits to adjuncts, would mean that roughly 500,000 part-time adjunct positions would be lost, or about two-thirds of the 750,000 now in existence.

March 20, 2016 ・ From The Wall Street Journal