<p>^ You’re darned right, it’s expensive to live in California. That makes it difficult for the UCs to attract some faculty they want, both at the entry-level and at the senior lateral level. But they do a fantastic job with what they’ve got, they can always find some people for whom the prestige outshines the money, and once people come, many never want to leave even if they could make more elsewhere. That could change, though. The mandatory “furlough” days currently being imposed on UC faculty—essentially just a 10% across-the-board pay cut, since they don’t get any reduction in their workload, only in their pay envelope—is a real kick in the teeth for a lot of faculty who feel they’re already underpaid relative to their peers across the Bay at Stanford or elsewhere around the country, especially when you take cost of living into account. Some will leave. And that threatens the very foundations of the UC system. It’s a real crisis.</p>