Oakton CC Tells Dept. Chairs: “Limit Adjuncts’ Hours to Avoid Affordable Healthcare Act Pay-out”
by Tom Robb
When Henry Ford first put his Model T’s and Model A’s on the assembly line, he introduced a revolutionary concept: workers should be able to afford the cars they are making. That concept seems lost on today’s business leaders and others.
Last week, Oakton Community College, which serves Glenview and several North Shore communities, held a meeting in which academic department heads and union officials were told to limit adjunct instructors credit hours of work. Union officials say college administrators wanted to ensure none of their adjunct faculty would work enough hours to qualify for mandatory health insurance under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), also called “Obamacare” by some, that takes effect next year.
The ACA mandates employees working more than 30 hours per week receive health insurance with a few exceptions for small companies. Meanwhile, disparities between what those at the top of the income ladder earn compared to those at the bottom continue to widen.
The ACA and proposed hike to $9 per hour in the minimum wage leads business leaders to claim the sky is falling, saying the moves would kill “job creation.” As seen locally by officials at Oakton, this phenomenon is
Short URL: http://www.adjunctnation.com/?p=5060
This is an excellent point, one made by activists around the country:
//In the short-term, lower wages and hiring part-time rather than full-time employees not entitled to benefits does make for higher profits. However, in the long-term this kind of nickel and diming of the workforce leads to an unhealthy community populated with workers who are stressed by their inability to pay mounting bills and work longer hours for less money.//
It kills innovation in the most resilient, talented, intelligent, and accomplished teachers, the adjunct faculty.
We know how short-sighted corporate capitalism kills whole professions, industries, and economies. Banking. Energy. Real Estate. Insurance. Savings and Loan. We know this. We know this does work. Yet, now higher education is following the rest of the sheep off the cliff.
Enough already.
Adjunct equity now.
Support the students and their familes by giving them the best education available.
End the administrative gluttony.
Renew our commitment to each other and our professions.
Restart in a way that taps human ingenuity.
No more fear of the “workers”
No more fear of reprisal.
You won’t need to worry about reprisal if you weren’t encouraging inequity.
Right?
We can do this!
-Robert
http://n1academy.com