[gchallen]

One of the biggest problems with overheads is that administrators are frequently simply unable to explain or justify them.

The vast majority of research-active universities in the US are non-profit, and so it doesn't really make sense to say that the universities is "profiting" off of overheads. Overheads are also negotiated with each funding agency, and my understanding is that the university has to prepare a fairly detailed case to support their particular number. They can't just make something up.

But overhead rates can vary fairly significantly between similar institutions. And when, as a faculty member, you start asking questions about why, you're frequently met with defensiveness, nonsense, or both. When I worked in the Northeast, I remember someone claiming that our overheads were 10+% higher than another institution due to... snow removal. (Which wasn't that effective either.)

Overheads also seem to only go up. Because of course.

Provide a reasonable justification for why you're charging me a certain amount, and how the money gets spent, and we're cool. I understand the university is a complex place and there's a lot involved in supporting what I'm doing. But when you can't provide a reasonable explanation, people start to wonder why not.

[yunohn]

> are non-profit, and it doesn't really make sense to say that the universities is "profiting" off of overheads

IMO “non-profit” is a misnomer.

It only implies that the organisation’s owners (funders, equity holders, etc) do not take a profit.

It does /not/ mean that the people involved don’t make money - income, fees, admin overhead, building/contracts/employment favoritism, etc. There are infinite ways to leech money that don’t involve taking “profits”.

[mattmanser]

It's literally what the company setup means. You can allege that people in every non-profit are committing fraud, but it's not a misnomer.

[iamerroragent]

I'm perplexed what the problem is here?

My partner works in grant management for a public r1. I believe the rate the university gets is about .57.

That pays for facilities and education programs and funding the department itself. Bringing in money makes the university happy and your pay check bigger though the accounting on it sounds obnoxious and not always guaranteed (salary cuts to cover overruns, etc).

However if you think about it, That's probably about how much private employees make for their employer anyways if not more. Annoying but hey that's the way the system is, you're getting paid to make someone else more money.

[currymj]

From the perspective of a grad student, you're getting paid $20k/year in a HCOL area, the grant is getting charged like $40k a year (somewhere around $20k of "tuition remission" charged on fake tuition that nobody actually pays), and then the government is actually paying $60k/year due to overhead. This is frustrating.

Where's that extra $40k going?

I had a small desk in a shared office and I guess used some electricity for my computer, and there was custodial staff who cleaned that building. That's about all I can think of, and I don't think it cost the university $40k/student/year.

Campus amenities were paid for by a $600 mandatory fee which came out of my paycheck separately.

It's not paying for compute -- the computing resources I used were bought separately through grant money. If it was paying administrators, then how come every time I needed to do something it had to go through the same handful of extremely overworked people?

You could see where people would start to get annoyed.

[madsbuch]

> I'm perplexed what the problem is here?

...

> Annoying but hey that's the way the system is

Wut? First, why the self contradiction. If it is annoying then there is a problem, that point of annoyance.

And keep in mind, as also pointed out elsewhere, this is not how it is everywhere.

You might be content with the situation (which is understandable, as your wife gets her pay by it), but that does not mean there are no issues are that's how it is.

[freetime2]

> I'm perplexed what the problem is here?

It sounds like there is a large potential for corruption and waste with such an opaque system.

[nightfly]

> Overheads also seem to only go up

Inflation says hello

[advisedwang]

Overhead is $ of overhead of $ per grant, so this isn't inflation, it's a higher proportion of grants going to admin vs research.

[diziet]

Significantly higher than inflation, too.