Ever wonder why faculty salaries often vary widely within a school? MoneyLaw’s Jeffrey L. Harrison, a professor at the University of Florida College of Law, offers some good explanations, all of which bear little or no relation to the value of a given professor to the school. Here’s a sampling:
Playing favorites. Don’t tell me it does not happen. Deans “see” some people as more valuable to the school when they may just be more valuable to the dean. Years later someone may come along and ask why X’s salary is so high. In many instances it is because X was the darling of a past or current dean.
Unpredictable allocations. Suppose the lowest-paid person on your salary makes $100K. In September, your dean offers an entry-level person $102K assuming that for the next year there will be a 3% increase and the current people will be elevated above the newcomer. The legislature actually says no raises and now the entry person is ahead of more seasoned and more valuable people.
Tunnel vision matching offers. Deans get really focused on keeping particular people and lose sight of the market more generally. Suppose a hotshot gets a better offer elsewhere and your school matches or beats the offer. Equally productive people like where they teach and could but do not go out and get an offer. It’s an instant problem. Plus, the matching offers are often way too much. Does a college-town school really have to match the offer of a high-cost-of-living school? Of course not. Finally, and this is where tunnel vision hurts the most. As the bidding goes up and up I have yet to hear of a dean say “Wait! For that salary I could go into the market and get someone even better.”
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