Our nation's great institutions of higher learning exist for a very clear and noble purpose: to enrich themselves, and, by extension, their football coaches. Data shows that they are pursuing this mission with selfless zeal.

Of course football coaches are going to get paid more than college professors— football coaches have to do pushups, occasionally. The interesting thing revealed by a new study is that the coaches' salaries are not only bigger, they also increase much faster than those of teachers. Even during hard times. From Inside Higher Ed:

The SEC saw the highest escalation in football coaching salaries (though it was outpaced in instructional salaries by seven other conferences) through the “Great Recession.” In that conference – home to about a quarter of the nation’s 23 athletic programs where revenues actually outpace expenses – instructional salaries rose 15.5 percent between 2006 and 2011, from $70,886 to $81,758. At the same time, football coaching salaries increased 128.9 percent, from $3,147,149 to $6,928,989. That escalation was smallest in the WAC, where football salaries rose 46.4 percent, from $1,370,332 to $1,819,845, and instructional paychecks rose 15.2 percent (a faster increase than several other conferences), from $65,038 to $76,533.

John Rawls or, uh, Bear Bryant would be proud! And don't worry, there are plenty of poor families to subsidize those coaching salaries.

Gators.

[Inside Higher Ed. Photo: AP]