Academics have let themselves get managed by a gigantic administrative class, and unlike engineers, they barely even get paid for it.

Yes but with the chance at a job-for-life guarantee and possibly months off per year.

My wife & I have a couple academic friends and they make 1/4 our income probably, but they are unfireable & they also just took off for another 6 weeks stay in southern Europe at a family home this summer .. so there's that.

Guaranteed income & time flexibility are hard to measure in absolute dollars.

My wife & I are on the other hand on our 5th/6th job in our almost 20 year careers, never having had more than 2.5 weeks off consecutively. The hustle now is maximizing the dollars and building some alternative income streams so we can start to wind down the intensity in maybe 10 years and fully exit workforce in 20 years?

They are just bureaucrats. So there’s precedence for both.