Citing Economy, UW Cuts Raises In Half

It’s a step in the right direction.

Citing what has been called the worst budget crisis in state history, University of Wisconsin System President Kevin Reilly today cut in half - from 5.2% to 2.5% - his recommendation for annual pay raises for faculty and academic staff.

“For now, we must demonstrate that our public university is sensitive to the public’s dire financial situation,” Reilly said in a statement.

In 2006, the UW Board of Regents recommended annual raises of 5.2%, citing research that UW System academic salaries were about 10% lower than on competing campuses. The Legislature and Gov. Jim Doyle ultimately approved pay raises of 2% in the first year of the current budget, and 3% in the second year.

Of course, a wage freeze would be even better. 

1. What an ignorant hillbilly.

   Posted by on November 29, 2008 at 0035 hrs




2. And who would that be, Keith?

   Posted by on November 29, 2008 at 0342 hrs




3. Why stop at a wage freeze?  How about we cut their pay in half so they all leave?

   Here’s a better idea.  How about we just close Stout, River Falls, and Parkside, and add seats at other campuses, including the UW Colleges, to absorb the difference?

   Posted by Recess Supervisor on November 29, 2008 at 0411 hrs




4. I don’t know too many taxpayers who are getting raises this year.  In fact, many are lucky to just have a job.  Why should someone sucking off the taxpayer tit get 5.2% to begin with?

   Now if MATC would demonstrate a little concern for the taxpayer.

   R.C. - would you rather have more jobs leave the state?  Or a few underworked-and-overpaid professors?  That’s pretty much the choice here.  Employers can’t afford to stay in Wisconsin.  And the state and local government payroll is a big part of the problem.

   Posted by Steve on November 29, 2008 at 0426 hrs




5. At a minimum, this shows awareness by a government body that there are economic issues out there.  Cutting the pay raise is a good start; I had heard that Gov. Doyle might be freezing some state salaries—that would be another good step in the right direction.

   It’s better than the utility companies going to the taxpayers with rate hikes to cover their pension plan losses in the market: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-ap-wi-pension-ut ilities,0,505024.story

   

   Posted by hsgbdmama on November 29, 2008 at 0920 hrs




6. Some of you guys should read the particulars of the auto industry bailout debate.

   Essentially all the foreign car companies built their plants in sunbelt states with low taxes and no union labor.  Not coincidentally, their costs are about half of what it costs for labor here in the upper midwest. 

   We can debate all we want about whether it is right to “exploit the worker” as they do down South, but the bottom line is those are the cards a place like Wisconsin is dealt. 

   Unless we figure out a way to draw business here via a major change in tax incentives, we’ll end up going the way of GM.  Unfortunately our tourism industry isn’t big enough to support 5 million people nor a massive State University system.

   Posted by on November 29, 2008 at 0921 hrs




7. The reason many taxpayers aren’t getting a raise this year is because there’s an oversupply of undereducated, blue-collar labor relative to demand.  That, and a lot of the companies they work for are poorly managed.  Hell, there’s an oversupply of entry-level, white-collar workers as well.  So sure, perhaps it makes sense to freeze pay of certain agency positions as well.

   There will always, however, be a demand for the most talented people in society, which is why these professors don’t have so much to worry about.  If we don’t want to pay them, someone else will.  You can like that or not, but it’s the reality of the situation either way.  That’s also why you won’t see a lot of professional athletes worrying about a salary freeze because the economy is underperforming.

   There are lots of reasons to suggest that the university should trim its budget, but one I will never agree with is so that we can hold on to jobs in dying industries for just a little bit longer.  By that logic, Michigan should close its universities and give their resources to the automakers, who would then proceed to piss those resources away on bloated labor costs and products nobody wants.

   I would, however, be inclined to agree with Steve in that our “massive” university system could stand to be streamlined.  Educating more kids at fewer campuses provides enormous operating efficiencies.  But as we all know, politicians aren’t brave enough to take any kind of bold action.  They’ll just keep operating a gazillion schools so that kids with a 2.8 GPA and a 22 on the ACT can go to school at campuses that barely outperform the University of Phoenix.

   Posted by Recess Supervisor on November 29, 2008 at 1203 hrs




8. RS,

   That last paragraph makes a lot of sense.

   Along with saving money, when can we get past pension nonsense?  The automakers are giving us all a good lesson in that an organization can’t go on paying people who do not go to work.  It’s going to catch up to everyone.  More companies, all levels of government and the University system.  Why can’t they just give the money in a 401K, 403b, or 457?

   Posted by on November 29, 2008 at 1233 hrs




9. I’m not sure I agree with the proposition that if we don’t pay these professors, many other places will.  As I think back over my years of schooling, I’m not sure the best paid and most tenured teachers were the best.  As a matter of fact, they were some of my worst, especially at UW-Madison. 

   Frankly, I’m quite certain the UW system could go on a recruiting jaunt in India and offer teaching positions in certain disciplines such as math, science and engineering and find plenty of qualified takers to move to Madison at half the price UW is currently paying their faculty. 

   The world is having to live with 30% less of the wealth it had a few months ago. No reason why the UW system would not be able to as well.

   Posted by on November 29, 2008 at 1719 hrs




10. Idiodtic comments, Steve.  Other states would kill to have a flagship campus like UW-Madison.  In fact, when Arizona State hired its new President last year, he said that he wanted to upgrade ASU to the status of the great state university.

    Where do you folks think that the high-tech jobs in Wisconsin will come from if not Madison?

    Posted by on November 29, 2008 at 1741 hrs




11. Maybe they would come from the companies that are being taxed out of existence.

    Posted by Steve on November 29, 2008 at 1757 hrs




12. RS, I don’t understand what is idiotic about Steve’s comments.  Maybe not practical, but certainly not idiotic.  I’d second the opinon that both in college and in high school that most of my best teachers, and my kids best teachers haven’t been the tenured, high paid guys.  As for myself, while I am a grad of UW, I’d be all privatising the entire system.  Instead of subsidising the university, you could subsidize the student, as long as they were a resident attending a school in the state.  As soon as you take the taxing authority away from the school, and make them compete on merit and $$$, you’d be surprised how soon they got streamlined.

    Posted by on November 29, 2008 at 1817 hrs




13. I didn’t say his comments were idiotic, Curt.  That would’ve been Wally.

    Whatever you think of teaching ability of certain high-level, tenured professors, their knowledge and knack for research is the reason those other great teachers are hanging around.  Take the professors out of the equation and you can’t recruit teaching assistants.  The terminal degree candidates and junior faculty that do a lot of the teaching at a major research university are there for a reason, and it’s not the face-to-face time with a room of 300 freshmen.

    Cutting the UW in the name of economic stimulus is an absurd notion.  Again, all for streamlining here.  But pretending that the tax dollars supporting the UW are somehow killing Wisconsin’s business climate is ridiculous.  If we’re talking about spending that doesn’t correlate to the economy, let’s talk about MA, an oversized corrections budget, or the K-12 school districts that spend nearly as much per student as the universities do but still can’t graduate kids that can write a decent essay.  MA is a quality of life program with virtually no economic benefit to state residents.

    Streamline the UW System where you can.  Close a few underperforming campuses, take some of the savings, and add seats elsewhere.  Sit down with business leaders in Wisconsin and figure out where it is that we can improve our technical colleges so that our vocational schools are better meeting the needs of our employers.  There’s a reason all of these for-profit schools are popping up.  There’s clearly a weakness in our educational system that these schools are competing to fill.

    Finally, encourage more underperforming students to consider a vocational school instead of pushing them into a four-year university where the professors have to teach them the difference between there, their, and they’re - and believe me, if you have friends who teach at a university, you know there are a lot of freshmen out there who can’t do that.  We waste a lot of tax dollars providing people with an education that is really a bad fit for their own talents and career goals.

    Sad thing about college is that it’s the new high school.  Most kids, largely because of lazy, uninvolved parenting, get shuffled off to college to learn the things they should’ve learned in high school.  Maybe the UW System would be better off if we were more like European countries that provide fewer seats at public universities but provide better support to those students who are enrolled.

    As to privatization, I’m not sure how exactly one privatizes a land-grant college like UW-Madison.  Maybe you could do the homework there and get back to us?

    Posted by Recess Supervisor on November 29, 2008 at 1913 hrs




14. "opinon”, “privatising” and “subsidising” from a UW grad?  perhaps Steve’s right - Curt might have learned more from an import!

    Posted by on December 01, 2008 at 1349 hrs




15. The crisis is getting worse and worse and who know when or who would be able to stop it. Any suggestions about it?

    Posted by F4I Fairings on December 07, 2008 at 1048 hrs