Rapid rise in professors aged over 65 sparks opportunities debate

Although I am looking forward to retirement in a few years well before the age of 70, I do not believe that the number of older staff necessarily prevents younger staff promotions. In fact, I have seen the opposite in my own department where many of my colleagues have reached the rank of Professor at an age when I had only just joined the department as a Lecturer. Moreover, at my university, there is no "quota" for different grades. It is possible and very likely that departments become "top-heavy" with most staff being Readers or Professors so there is no issue in terms of progression. Since the majority of staff are expected to produce research and to teach, this does not create any problems in terms of overall load.

The sector is going to have to give up its long held fantasy of a typical academic career path. It is by no means typical any more for someone to enter as a full time permanent lecturer and slowly rise up the ranks. More likely these days is that academics are moving from one fixed term contract to the next for large parts of their careers. As the article points out older faculty with reputations are critical for winning research income to support more junior (not necessarily younger) researchers on less secure contracts. If those junior researchers manage to last it out going from one insecure contract to the next, they will not make it to professor until late in their career. Then they will be forced to retire early by his logic!

Has there been a growth in the numbers of Professors over the past decade or so? At about what age are staff becoming Professors? And has that changed over recent years?

Isn’t this also effectively a consequence of the slashed pay and pensions for everyone over the last decade? Staff working longer in order to have enough money for retirement? And also in career average/ final salary schemes having a higher salary for longer is a distinct advantage. So the profs win both ways. More intergenerational inequity baked into the system...