The other reason is that all universities, public and private, have become far too top heavy, inventing all sorts of administrative posts without any demonstrable need. The American Association of University Professors recently did a study which shows that while professor’s salaries have remained relatively constant in the last ten years (adjusting for inflation), the salaries for upper administration have nearly doubled (adjusting for inflation). Further, while the faculty size relative to number of students has remained relatively constant over the same time period, the number of upper administration positions has increased 50%.

You do the math.

And this was all before the recent “crisis”.

Only until the General Assembly introduces new legislation to bring back accountability by the BOR to someone (other than themselves), these student fee increases will continue.

One example of the BOR’s “exclusive authority” is below:
Here’s how much university presidents have accumulated or collected in deferred pay since 2004, according to records provided by the University System, tax returns and financial statements. The figures reflect payments or set-asides of state money and, where known, of funds from a school’s associated foundation (and NOT appropriately disclosed to public & private donors, faculty and staff).
Link to full story:
http://www.atlantaunfiltered.com/2009/10/05/university-execs-deferred-pay-often-hidden-tops-7-million/
$1,820,697 — Wayne Clough, former Georgia Tech president (includes $500,000 cash, a $38,000 car and a split-dollar life insurance policy valued at $750,000 from the foundation)
$1,666,639 — Carl Patton, retired Georgia State University president
$1,573,606 — Michael Adams, UGA president (includes $786,106 due from the UGA Foundation as of June 2008)
$600,000 — David Bell, Macon State University president (includes $400,000 due from the Macon State foundation)
$495,990 — Thomas Meredith, former University System chancellor (includes $180,990 from the University System of Georgia Foundation)
$480,000 — Daniel Rahn, Medical College of Georgia president
$262,500 — Erroll B. Davis Jr., University System chancellor
$127,000 — Beheruz Sethna, University of West Georgia president
$90,000 — Dan Papp, Kennesaw State University foundation
$75,000 — Bud Peterson, Georgia Tech president since April 1
$7,191,432 – Total

This is how I have delt with the rediculous book prices. I never purchase from the bookstores. Contact the professor at least 1 month before classes start. Ask them what books they will be using. Also, go to the bookstore. Find the classes, and write down the ISBN for all required texts so you know you have the correct information. Next, hit the internet. Keep a check on places like ebay. There are other websites like bookfinder.com that will allow you to enter in the ISBN information, as well as other details, and search 100’s of websites for you. It then organizes it by which website has the cheapest book. You have to do this several weeks before classes start to be able to choose the cheapest shipping options, and ensure your book arrives before classes start. Also, one of my best finds has been the international edition books. These books have a different ISBN, and they will have a soft cover instead of a hard cover. However, they are usually at least half the price. They do usually ship from places like India. The content inside has always been identical. They are in English, so no fears there. Usually the shipping is higher (~$20), but the cost of the book has been up to $150 cheaper at times. I have been known to purchase a book that costs $200 in the bookstore for $50 as an international edition. You can then resale these online at the end of the semester to make a little money back.

Many professors use “course packets,” instead of textbooks. Those packets, even though they may have been organized by the professors, they do not get a single penny from the sale of those materials. The bookstores (usually college bookstores) pay the copyright holders the fees to use any copyrighted materials and create the packets. They add on their profits to determine the price. However, no part of the price comes back to the professors. Even if professors wrote some of the materials included in the packets, they usually assign the copyright to the journal publishers, so the fees the bookstores pay to the publishers don’t come back to professors.

So, vast majority of professors aren’t really money-hungry profit seekers, unlike Ms. Palin who has no problem admitting she wants her book to sell. The number of textbooks sold in a specialized topic in economics is a very small fraction of the number of copies Ms. Palin’s book. If you write a “popular” books, then selling as many copies as possible should be your major goal. For those of us who live in an ivory tower, we don’t always think about profit when we write a textbook – that doesn’t mean a few of them are. A popular textbook in Intro Psych or Calculus probably makes a huge money for the authoring professor. But, when you write a textbook for an upper division course which may have 1 section with 15 students every other year, he profit you can get from it is rather limited.