*cannot supply sufficient doctors or other professionals, and the trades cannot attract apprentices, this is a symptom of the decadence I mention above and hardly the fault of universities*

Hang on there, Squeers/Mitchell. AFAIK the lack of doctors has
nothing to do with the lack of student applicants wanting to be
doctors. Fact is that our education system is provided with mega
billions of taxpayer dollars and its not producing the sorts
of qualifications that our society needs. Meantime everyone within
the system is making a pretty penny. I gather that heads of
universities earn 700k$ plus, so money is clearly not the problem.

So those who lead and run our education system are clearly failing.

*Australians dislike working harder than they have to and are fond of contemplating their navels. Australians in fact have a proud tradition of only working as hard as they have to--and they don't have to.*

Not quite correct, Squeers. Some Australians work very hard and
productively. A whole lot of others, which you mention, simply
sponge off the system because they can. So we have two working
speeds in Australia.

Thank you Mitchell, your last post highlights what is wrong with our higher education sector.

You must be favoured by councils as well, or you would be put out of business by the littering fines.

All those tickets you have on yourself obviously makes you totally blind to real life, & must cause a litter problem in some suburbs.

@ "Self deception is something that brings disaster when practiced by people with real disciplines."

and

@ "All those tickets (e.g. B Sc Mech Eng.) you have on yourself ..."

Hasbeen, there is a term for this ... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_projection

Quite intriguing actually, no university in Sydney (during the "Vietnam moratorium rubbish" sic) offered such a degree. They offered degrees in Science, or degrees in Mechanical Engineering, but no bachelor degree in Science Mechanical Engineering. Perhaps the Sydney Technical College?

Yabby,
Sorry for the delay replying; I've been busy hard-working.
It's a free country and no university is stopping people enrolling in courses; enrolments (demand) dictate direction and content, and for all the griping about the arts it's business and engineering faculties that overwhelmingly dominate my university--and produce the most useless research.
I'm down on universities for commodifying higher learning, for reducing the humanities and enlightenment, both individual and social, to economics and pragmatism. You don't seem to realise that universities, as an institution, are no longer dedicated to learning, only to supply. And since you've long been a staunch defender of free markets it's a bit rich complaining about lucrative high-end salaries--though I agree that the unproductive upper echelons in every sector are vastly overpaid. But this is surely a complaint about the system and not alleged anomalies within it? University elites are renumerated at the same obscene level as other elites and frankly you're being a bloody hypocrite for singling them out for that.
As for the dollars universities attract, that's more about governments minimising apparent unemployment and subsidising the skills base we're told we so desperately need to service growth; dubious for sure but that's government rather than tertiary machination. I've sat in on enough meetings to know that the government of the day calls the shots, and universities are necessarily opportunistic--it's called "competition".

Finally Yabs, my comments about Australians not working any harder than they have to hark back to convict days; Australia was built on exploited labour and the workforce adapted accordingly. The literature of the new nation rings with the discourse of advantage and resentment that still reverberates today. Though that resentment has always taken the form of selfishness and intolerance, then and now.

Hasbeen, sorry! All that talk about tickets tells me a lot about you too. I'd say you're second or third generation Irish Catholic, brought up on or in close familial contact with dairy farmers or beef producers. Temperate or abstinent, but bad tempered and apt to lash out against upstarts. Not a lover of animals, except dogs, and I doubt you have a degree--maybe a certificate in agriculture..?
That's all I'm getting.

*University elites are renumerated at the same obscene level as other elites and frankly you're being a bloody hypocrite for singling them out for that.*

Not so Squeers, for they are quite different. If a private company,
lets say Google for instance, decides to pay extra, to find the
talent that they require, then frankly it is none of my business.
I own no shares in Google and have never sent then a dollar.

If a university, or the tax office, or some other Govt dept, pays
ridiculous salaries, then as a taxpayer and a voter, it certainly is
my business. If that same university is then unable to fullfill its
role, of educating enough doctors to service our communities, yet
they are all paid huge money, I have every reason to be outraged.

Now in the past there was a kind of unwritten rule, that people worked for
Govt it they wanted security for life, its nearly impossible to fire them,
they also did not do that much as they were
not in the real world of the open and competitive market. Now it
seems, they want the salaries that go with performance and risk,
but you still can't sack them, just check the Public Services Act.

Sounds like all trotters in the trough to me