Cal Professor Pay Comes Under Fire
This is an interesting article from the Contra Costa Times:
…But, with his wife suddenly disabled and out of work, Crommie realized his salary of $74,200 lagged more than $50,000 behind the department and campus averages. Worried about future house payments and medical expenses, he found himself tempted to play the game for the first time…
…
Crommie’s situation is rooted in a UC Berkeley policy instituted about 10 years ago. Worried about top private universities raiding the school’s best faculty members, Cal administrators vowed to match salary offers from top competitors.
The policy has led to vastly disparate salaries within UC Berkeley departments, where the haves make far more than the have-nots.
At the Haas School of Business, the highest-paid full professor makes about $175,000 more than the lowest-paid full professor. In the economics department, the gap is about $165,000; in physics, about $111,000; and in history, about $104,000.
For most departments, the normal pay scale calls for a difference of about $60,000 between the highest and lowest salaries for full professors. School officials said they simply couldn’t afford to raise salaries significantly for the lowest-paid faculty members, so the salary-matching policy continues to skew the pay scales.
In some cases, administrators said, abnormal gaps simply illustrate that some professors are more productive than others. But often, it’s not that simple.
Several professors said they’re more likely to pursue job offers because of the salary-matching policy, while others said they’ve been subjected to a “loyalty tax” by not looking beyond Cal…
Generally, while I am very keen on attacking the issues surrounding administration salaries and “bonuses”, I try to stay away from attacking faculty salaries. And, I am going to keep consistent with that position here. Faculty salaries and contracts probably could be better structured to prevent this kind of thing. But, when it comes to the people who will be doing the top teaching and researching, I don’t see why the university should not pay top dollar to protect the quantity and quality of its research and academic outputs. I would much rather see my student fees go towards retaining valuable human capital than towards the typical bureaucracy that holds the UC system down in general.
It’s hard to argue with the policy. Having top professors increases rankings, among other things, which in turn attracts higher caliber students as well as more top professors. The minute we eliminate the policy, all the good professors leave and Cal goes down the crapper. Anybody have any better ideas?
Comment by J — July 12, 2006 @ 2:57 pm
I’m with you J.
Comment by Bhanu Singh — July 12, 2006 @ 3:09 pm