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USM Forum -- Message Board -> AAUP-USM MESSAGE BOARD -> Town v. Gown: Some Empirics
Post Info TOPIC: Town v. Gown: Some Empirics
Southern Justice

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Town v. Gown: Some Empirics
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Much is made of the town/gown divide that exists in Hattiesburg. Factors that often arise include education level and income level. I decided to do a little research via the internet to see if I could start to pinpoint the source of the gap.

First, let’s look at education level. According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, Mississippi is in the bottom two states in number of residents with a bachelor’s degree. West Virginia is third worst with 18.6% of its residents having bachelor’s degrees. Let’s assume (liberally) that Mississippi has 18.5% of its residents degreed at the BS or BA level. According to census.gov, the Hattiesburg MSA had 130,073 estimated residents in 2004. That means that in the Hattiesburg MSA there are (on average) 24,064 individuals with bachelor’s degrees. That also means that there are 106,009 individuals without a bachelor’s degree living in our immediate surroundings. Understanding averages and the population dispersion of Mississippi, Hattiesburg probably has a ratio more like 40,000 degreed individuals to 90,000 undegreed individuals. Still, those without a bachelor’s degree outnumber those with a bachelor’s degree by a margin of over 2 to 1. Next time you go to Wal-Mart, look around you. A minimum of 66% of the people you see didn’t graduate from college.

Let’s examine the post-bachelor’s credentials of our subset of bachelor’s attaines. FGH employs 250 physicians. Let’s assume that (based on size and a liberal guesstimate) Wesley employs about 150 physicians. Let’s add another 350 to cover dentists, nurse practitioners, lawyers, doctoral-holding non-faculty and pharmacists (all requiring specialized advanced degrees). That’s a total of 750 non-academic advanced degreed (beyond the master’s level – no judgment about terminal qualification, please) individuals in Hattiesburg. Let’s round that up to 1,000. Now add the (approximately) 750 terminally degreed individuals who work at Carey or USM. That means that of the estimated 40,000 individuals in Hattiesburg with a bachelor’s degree, only 1,750 have the rough equivalent of a Ph.D. in their field. Let’s round that up again to 2,000. That’s 2,000/40,000 = 5% of the bachelor’s degreed population and 1.54% of the Hattiesburg MSA population. Remember, I am being liberal with my estimates of the professionally-degreed population.

We (and our comparatively educated fellow residents) comprise less than 2% of the Hattiesburg area. Why should it surprise anyone that these people cannot begin to understand academia? Is it any wonder they don’t think like we do? Can you expect them to? Should we expect them to? 2%!!!!!! It turns out that we are outnumbered almost 100 to 1 when we go to Wal-Mart!

Now let’s look at income level. Say that the average USM prof’s salary (including administrators and former administrators) is $60,000 for 9 months (assume no summer teaching or research grants, etc.). Now let’s look at the average annual per capita income (from census.gov) fro Mississippi in 2005 dollars: $24,654.

To make an hourly wage comparison, the $60,000 must be spread over 12 months, and 12 months x 4 weeks/month x 40 hours x week gives a rough estimate of $31.25/hour on a 40-hour a week basis. I’m not saying that profs only work 40 hours per week, because I work a lot more than that, and I know many of you do as well. I’m just trying to get a basis for comparison. Here’s some comparison data:

Average Hourly Rates of Pay in Hattiesburg (bls.gov, CPI adjustor used to transform 1998 dollars to 2005 dollars):

Dentists $39.03
Lawyer $35.02
USM Prof $31.25
Pharmacists $31.25
Civil Engineers $25.38
Loan Officers $15.83
Roofers $13.49
Mechanic $13.29
Primary/Secondary School Teachers $13.05 (same method as profs)
Carpenter $12.83
Licensed Practicing Nurse $11.97
Bank Teller $10.14
Bartenders $7.30
Cashiers $7.23
Waiters/Waitresses $6.71
**Physician data not available

I understand that there’s a strong correlation between education and income. Take them together, and what this says is that most non-academics cannot identify with our work or the effort and sacrifice it took to get where we are. Furthermore, we make (on average) quite a bit more money (on a per year AND a per hour basis) than most of our neighbors. Think about the bank teller who helps you deposit your check, the mechanic who fixes your car, the loan officer who runs your mortgage application, the cashier who checks you out at Winn-Dixie, the waitress who brings you your food, and the bartender who pours you a drink. Most of them know where you work. Look at the disparity between our hourly wages and theirs. Do we work harder, less hard, equivalently, or just differently? Is this an easy concept to understand? Do these individuals have flexible schedules? Again, can and should we expect them to identify and support our lifestyles and professional freedom?


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No students, no money

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Southern Justice wrote:

Again, can and should we expect them to identify and support our lifestyles and professional freedom?
If they're interested in having a university in their community, along with all of the money the students bring in, they will support it.

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qwerty

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This is a very interesting post. Nothing like some real data to make a point. Pursuasive. Thanks!

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disgusted student

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Southern Justice, you really put in a lot of thinking time on the problem. But I wonder if it couldn't be as simple as mob rule. While most of the educated people I know don't like Thames - he is a native of Hattiesburg and he has forced people to take sides. Everybody who has ever had one complaint about USM can now sound off and feel good about it.

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asdf

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If it is simply an education and salary gap, why do you not see the same level of hostility toward dentists, lawyers, pharmacists, and physicians?

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Outside Observer

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asdf wrote:

If it is simply an education and salary gap, why do you not see the same level of hostility toward dentists, lawyers, pharmacists, and physicians?

1. There aren't as many of them.


2. They're not as visible ("in the news") as USM profs given the recent affairs at USM



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Old Prof

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Excellent analysis, Southern Justice.  Thanks for the time and effort you put into that.


I just want to add culture to the mix.  When I came to H'burg in the late 60's the residents were still in the culture shock that took place when the I-59 made the "sin city" of New Orleans only 2 hours away.  There was no dancing inside the city limits where liquor was served because of an ordance going back to WWII.  Night spots had to close at midnight.  Civil rights was still a very hot topic and "outsiders" were coming into the area from the north to help people register to vote.  Nationally the fight for legal abortion was beginning.  The state had a Sovereignty Commission to keep out the "communists".    All of this in a very conservative and religious fundamentalists region.  Is it any wonder that the population, even those trying to be nice, considered faculty very dangerous people?  Of course, good people try to put this behind them, but these are philosophical and religious issues that are very difficult to change. (Notice the letters on Evolution and I.D. continue in state papers.)


Now add your analysis to this cultural background and some may even consider that faculty are being treated pretty well. 



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Tuppy Glossop

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asdf wrote:
If it is simply an education and salary gap, why do you not see the same level of hostility toward dentists, lawyers, pharmacists, and physicians?


This issue was addressed by me on an earlier thread
here

This is part of what I said. I'm interested if others think it makes sense.

There is an extreme disconnect between what middle class/professional Hattiesburg does for a living and what we as faculty do. Most middle class folks in this town are small businessmen, or middle managers at local branches of regional or national companies. Their jobs are pretty much limited to managing the flow of paperwork in their office, or managing a sustaining operation like a bank branch or retail operation. Sound, honest work, to be sure, but not something that predisposes one towards ideas

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asdf

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Tuppy Glossop wrote:

There is an extreme disconnect between what middle class/professional Hattiesburg does for a living and what we as faculty do. ... Sound, honest work, to be sure, but not something that predisposes one towards ideas
I don't think it is a lack of understanding of what professors do.  I believe that it is more related to the feeling town people have that the problems at USM are no more than office politics (which many can relate) that have spilled out into the media (much as OO said).  This just adds to to the negative perception of academics in many conservative circles.

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Southern Justice

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Outside Observer wrote:
asdf wrote:
If it is simply an education and salary gap, why do you not see the same level of hostility toward dentists, lawyers, pharmacists, and physicians?

1. There aren't as many of them.
2. They're not as visible ("in the news") as USM profs given the recent affairs at USM


OO,

Let me add my own 1a to your post. Those who are not "terminally degreed" have more contact, on average, with dentists, lawyers, physicians, and pharmacists in those professionals' workplaces than they do with us in our setting. Simply said, most hattiesburg residents have a good idea WHAT dentists, lawyers, physicians, and pharmacists do for a living and HOW that profession impacts their lives DIRECTLY.

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Outside Observer

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Southern Justice wrote:

Outside Observer wrote: asdf wrote: If it is simply an education and salary gap, why do you not see the same level of hostility toward dentists, lawyers, pharmacists, and physicians? 1. There aren't as many of them. 2. They're not as visible ("in the news") as USM profs given the recent affairs at USM OO, Let me add my own 1a to your post. Those who are not "terminally degreed" have more contact, on average, with dentists, lawyers, physicians, and pharmacists in those professionals' workplaces than they do with us in our setting. Simply said, most hattiesburg residents have a good idea WHAT dentists, lawyers, physicians, and pharmacists do for a living and HOW that profession impacts their lives DIRECTLY.
Yep, agreed.  Even students, who spend quite a bit of time with faculty, don't really understand what we do.

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Mad Max

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I share your lack of understanding as to why those lowpaid, bigoted, uneducated, culturally barren, stupid, unenlightened slobs that don't have Ph.D.'s dislike us.

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Invictus

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Mad Max wrote:
I share your lack of understanding as to why those lowpaid, bigoted, uneducated, culturally barren, stupid, unenlightened slobs that don't have Ph.D.'s dislike us.


Not a clue!

(Thanks, MM -- funniest post in this rather dismal thread.)

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local prof

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At the root of this thread may be lurking the themes of Richard Florida in The Rise of the Creative Class and The Flight of the Creative Class.  Economic growth may be more tied to creativity than in the past and needs three things to flourish:  technology, talent, and tolerance.  We may be observing some flight locally partially as a result of (fill in the blank).  My fear is that what passes for "leadership" in this state considers some loss of growth a price worth paying in order not to have to deal with a smart mouth creative class that, in their minds, doesn't know their place.  More probably they don't even know there is a cost.

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Cossack

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While I agree with much of the analysis posted on this thread, I think we should not lose sight of the fact that the attendees of the Elks Lake function were not low income uneducated folks. Several physicians attended. I would wager that the mean income of those attendees was quite a bit higher than the average faculty. I also think that there were multiple motives for people attending, from curiosity to active dislike of faculty. The bottom line is that they are not big fans of faculty members and are not likely to change.

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Southern Justice

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Cossack wrote:
While I agree with much of the analysis posted on this thread, I think we should not lose sight of the fact that the attendees of the Elks Lake function were not low income uneducated folks. Several physicians attended. I would wager that the mean income of those attendees was quite a bit higher than the average faculty. I also think that there were multiple motives for people attending, from curiosity to active dislike of faculty. The bottom line is that they are not big fans of faculty members and are not likely to change.


Cossack,

Less than 100 people reportedly attended (were invited) to the Warren Paving meeting. Surely some of them were doctors, lawyers, etc., as you say. I'm not talking about those people because they have other motives for taking SFT's side: profit, politics, loyalty, etc., etc. They know perfectly well what it is we do, and they choose not to side with us because they'd rather get sweetheart deals from SFT through USM (examples: paving on campus, fancy streetlights on campus) or they'd rather play a political game that has some other positives for them. I've written these people off as having a completely different values system than I do, because they ought to know better but act against us anyway.

The "regular" folks I was focusing on in my earlier post are different. Contrary to the implication by Invictus, I am not trying to make this a dismal thread. I'm pointing out that, in most instances, individuals in Hattiesburg have little or no chance of actually seeing us at work or even beginning to understand what we do. How, then, can we expect them to take "our side" in a fight over what we do when (a) they don't know what it is that we do, and (b) our opponents are individuals with the esteem of the community and who perform functions easily understandable to the average person? What can we do to overcome one of the basest human reactions: envy (related to salaries and work requirements)?

You're focusing on the guy who owns Warren Paving or who runs the Coca Cola bottling plant. I'm wondering about the guy who drives the asphalt truck or stocks the Coke machines in the Hub. What could be done to reach those people?

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Cossack

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You're focusing on the guy who owns Warren Paving or who runs the Coca Cola bottling plant. I'm wondering about the guy who drives the asphalt truck or stocks the Coke machines in the Hub. What could be done to reach those people?

I doubt that you can reach those people. They are mostly unaffected by the university unless one of their family works or worked for USM. They are removed from both the group that attended the meeting and faculty. Moreover, I do not think that the lower income folks are the problem we face. I also do not think that very many of the people at the meeting directly benefit from SFT's deals.

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Southern Justice

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Cossack wrote:
I also do not think that very many of the people at the meeting directly benefit from SFT's deals.


I thought that, too. Then I thought:

What about the paving on campus? Was that bid or was that contracted on a basis such that it doesn't require a bid? Could SFT have given Warren all the paving business on his own?

Is the Coca-Cola monopoly contract for campus competitively bid?

Where does the University purchase its fleet vehicles? Is there a prescribed method or can SFT purchase them a few at a time so as not to trigger the necessity for a bidding process? Could SFT purchase from, say, Petro if Dossett fails to support him?

Where is the University's local banking done? Can it be moved from one bank to another without IHL approval? Could SFT drop Bank Corp South if Union Planters fails to show support?

Did the light poles come from Chain Electric or somewhere else?

Does the University (central admin) refer new faculty members to realtors when they are hired? Is there a rotation of realtors that can be traced, or is it "random"?

If the University needs to farm out special groundskeeping services, catering services, or other special projects, to whom does it turn?

I think there is a real possibility that many individuals attended that meeting to either maintain their position or to make inroads for future consideration.







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USM Sympathizer

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I think Southern Justice wins the prize for the most stimulating posts of the day.  Thanks for giving us all some substantive things to think about!

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Rx Spouse

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You are way low on your estimate for pharmacists' salary.  Try about $53 per hour. Starting salaries in the industry are pretty consistent, even in different georgraphical regions.

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Southern Justice

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Rx Spouse wrote:
You are way low on your estimate for pharmacists' salary.  Try about $53 per hour. Starting salaries in the industry are pretty consistent, even in different georgraphical regions.


Sorry, but all estimates (other than the USM Prof salary) are taken from the Bureau of Labor Statistics at www.bls.gov.

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asdf

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Southern Justice wrote:

...the Warren Paving meeting. Surely some of them were doctors, lawyers, etc., as you say. I'm not talking about those people...

SJ, you should be worrying about this group of people.  They are the decision makers in town.  They are the people who are actually engaged, pay attention to what is going on in Hattiesburg, and read the editorial section of the paper.  They do not simply listen to what WDAM tells them, they know what is going on.


These people are members of the right circles, clubs, and churches.  I know these people and I know that other people take what they say as gospel.  They stand around before Sunday School, sipping coffee, hanging on every word one of this crowd has to say.  The managers talk with their owners, then pass info on to the supervisors, who pass info to the workers.  They don't check the facts, if Mister So-and-so said it, it must be true.  After all, he is part of the class of people who knows everything and everybody.  Heck they feel privileged that they have been let in on a secret that normally requires a six figure income to know.



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foot soldier

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A quote from the other thread (sorry, I forgot to copy to author's name):

"Hattiesburg simply doesn't have what Richard Florida call "the creative class". Outside of USM faculty there is almost no one who makes their living manipulating, expressing, or discovering knowledge and ideas. There are virtually no artists, writers, scientists, internet entrepreneurs, publishers, software developers, business consultants, or anyones else who derives their livelihood from the more advanced activities in the American economy. There may be a few folks here and there, but they are outliers, not representative of the community and its economy."

Now that I live in a "college town" this is readily apparent to me. When I go for coffee, I am not the only nonstudent with a laptop. It seems everyone around me in the coffeeshop is writing a book of some king (fiction, nonfiction, etc.—though I do acknowledge lots of them are just reading their e-mail). In Hattiesburg, I always felt strange working (i.e. doing intellectual work) in restaurants or coffeeshops, because I was often the only one doing so.

When I lived in Hattiesburg (and shopped at Walmart) my seemingly upper class status was readily apparent to me. But it always seemed to me that there are people in Hattiesburg with money. Think of those big houses out West that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. There are also some very nice homes south of campus about a mile or two. Who are those people and what do they do for a living? They must have making more money than I was!

It has often been stated on this board, that the cultural offerings of USM are one of the things that makes the area attractive to retirees--the orchestra and concerts, the lecture series (that folded, yes?) the theater productions, etc. Don't the "upper classes" of Hattiesburg recognize the value, at least economically of that? My sense is, unfortunately, no. They think the chief attraction of Hattiesburg is the golf (at least the trolls think so!). It does seem that people in Hattiesburg generally don't recognize the cultural value of USM.

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Isaac Bickerstaff

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Mad Max wrote:

I share your lack of understanding as to why those lowpaid, bigoted, uneducated, culturally barren, stupid, unenlightened slobs that don't have Ph.D.'s dislike us.
Most brilliant post in a great long time,  worthy of Jonathan Swift.

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