Well, erm, I'm a professor at a mid-size comprehensive (that is, not a Research I) university.

I'm sorry to hear you've had bad experiences with professors. As with other professions, sometimes people are jerks and sometimes they tire out. And certainly, none of us is perfect.

I think most professors work pretty hard, but much of our work is invisible to the public and maybe doesn't seem important. And we don't do a very good job explaining what we do.

When I was a student, in the late 70s, the taxpayers of the state of California provided about 70% of the cost of my education at a UC school. Now, I'm guessing the state contributes something more like 25-30% of the cost of a student's education at a UC school. Some of the rest is made up by corporate stuff, but mostly the difference is paid by students. When I was a student, people who needed financial aid often got grants; now students with the same level of need get loans so they're starting out with serious debt. The same trend has happened in a lot of states.

The public used to perceive universities and colleges as a public good, the idea being that a well educated citizenry would contribute more to the economy and so forth. Think about the growth of public education in the GI bill era after WWII, and how significantly that growth was echoed in economic prosperity in the 50s and 60s.

That perception started changing in the 80s; now the public perceives higher education as a private good, and wants individuals to pay for it. To me that seems a huge mistake. And the unwillingness to pay for education is echoed at the elementary and secondary levels; our schools are badly strapped for cash.

In the state where I work now (Wisconsin), the prison system has grown in state funding while the university budget has shrunk. If you chart the money out for both institutions, the graphs are heartbreaking. We're willing to pay for jails, but not for education and programs that will help people contribute to their communities and not end up in jails. When you think about the 80s, the whole "tough on crime" movement paralleled the move away from funding education well. Now our prisons are more and more crowded, and our students are hurting. Personally, I'd rather put my tax money towards school funding at all levels, and I vote accordingly, but there are a lot of people who think differently and vote accordingly.

Wisconsin state employees have taken a 3.06 or so percent pay cut this year (called "furloughs" in hopes that it won't be permanent). But we have it good compared to California employees, who are looking at 6% plus. On the other hand, we're among the lowest paid faculty in the upper midwest, and we haven't had a raise in like 5 years (our promised raise last year, 2%, was cut in addition to the 3% cut).

Education is expensive and you can't really outsource it. Even if you pay instructors modest wages, you're still paying ever increasing health and benefits costs. It's hard to make educational productivity grow in the same way that industries have made productivity increase through greater automation and such. Students aren't widgets. (Our cost increases are somewhat similar to those in medicine and for some of the same reasons, though their salaries tend to be a whole lot better.)

And now, I have to get back to grading. Sorry for writing such a long response.