This paper synthesizes leading national studies of academic labor markets and focuses on the implications of changes in faculty labor markets for comprehensive universities, four-year primarily undergraduate universities that are neither research universities nor liberal arts colleges. It draws on several national studies to present statistics on anticipated faculty supply and demand for higher education as a whole and then disaggregates those statistics for comprehensive institutions. It also presents responses to the changing labor market in several departments in comprehensive institutions, as indicated in preliminary findings from a field study in New England. Described are the means by which some institutions have responded to changes in their labor pools and how some departments remain passive while others act proactively. It is noted that the departments most successful in recruiting and retaining productive faculty are devising creative strategies to this end. Several ways are suggested in which comprehensive institutions might respond to changes in the faculty labor market. Changes in the demand side are preferred rather than initiating supply side activities. Activities include basing promotion, tenure, and pay increases in ways supporting differentiated career paths; promoting alternative sources of faculty, introducing flexible time-tables for promotion and tenure decisions, development by institutions of strong and unique programs in certain areas thus making themselves more attractive to prospective faculty. Contains 20 references. (GLR)