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President Scholz pays Provost Chris Long $670K to email faculty saying he wants to cut their pay

By uomatters on 08/26/2024

Today the faculty union had a bargaining session with the administration, but nothing happened on salaries because the administration still has not provided the union with the analysis discussed in the email sent out to the faculty under Provost Long’s name 2 weeks ago.

As an aside, I can understand Scholz’s desire to blame this sort of email on his provost so that he can claim the faculty’s love when he finally caves on salary – but doesn’t he understand that lying about the obvious things is not the way to build trust? FWIW there’s some relevant work by his former colleagues at Wisconsin: Building Rational Cooperation, Andreoni and Samuelson (2006).

The money graph from “Long’s” email:

This analysis shows that, when adjusted for retirement contributions, payroll deductions for health insurance, and cost of living, UO faculty total compensation is at 98.3 percent of the average of our AAU public peers. Key findings of the analysis include …

This was then used to justify the administration’s 3% a year raise proposal – far less than enough to even keep up with inflation, much less move salaries to the AAU average, a goal first proposed by President Richard Lariviere back in 2009. Scholz’s proposal would lead to a further decrease in UO compensation both in real terms and relative to the AAU, Big-10, etc.

Contrast what Scholz had Long send to the faculty with the email Lariviere had his Provost Jim Bean send out here:

From: Provost
Sent: Sunday, June 07, 2009 12:26 PM
To: Deans Working Group
Subject: Faculty Salaries
The Missouri article stating that UO has the lowest salaries in the AAU has caused quite a stir (we have since verified that they were correct). Low salaries were always thought of as just Oregonian. But 34 out of 34 is a whole other thing. We cannot have this. Richard’s reaction was “this is job #1.” Richard will likely have an announcement on how we are attacking this when politically feasible (after last gavel). Please communicate to your faculty that the Missouri article really got our attention. This may require disruptive solutions.
Thanks, Jim

We’re still at the bottom of the AAU – the faculty I mean – UO’s top administrators are now in the middle – but now we’ve got a President who thinks that’s where we belong:

From: “Provost Christopher P. Long” <[email protected]>
Subject: UA bargaining update: Salary offer and AAU comparators
Date: August 14, 2024 at 2:00:32 PM PDT
Dear UO community,
The University of Oregon’s bargaining team met with United Academics yesterday and had discussions about the university’s salary proposal, including important principles that serve as a foundation for the proposal and comparator information that is helpful in contextualizing the university’s offer. The university’s current salary offer changes the first-year increase to an across-the-board increase rather than a merit increase, which was an expressed interest from United Academics.
Before detailing the specific salary counteroffer, it is important to cover several key points that lay a foundation for UO proposals.
  • We are fully committed to an outcome that positions UO faculty and the university for long-term success. Our core principles to advance university strategic goals, ensure operational flexibility, offer competitive total compensation, and maintain responsible financial stewardship guide our negotiations during this bargaining cycle.  
  • During this process, we must ensure that we are managing the institution’s long-term financial sustainability. When comparing the university to the Association of American Universities (AAU) peer compensation data, it is important to recognize that we do not have the same financial resources as those institutions. Specifically, in FY2022 (the last year comparative data was available) the UO received $86.4 million from the state whereas the average state appropriation for AAU peer institutions was $416.2 million. This means that the UO only had $3,863 of state support per student FTE, while the average AAU peer figure was $10,410. This difference equates to roughly $146.5 million per year of annual recurring state funding after adjusting for differences in enrollment size. AAU financial resources comparator data is detailed on the HR website and was shared in a previous email on March 18, 2024. 
  • In line with our core principle of competitive total compensation, we are working to support faculty salary increases through this negotiation process. While salary is the largest part of total compensation, the university’s retirement contributions and health insurance are important components, and they must be considered in any compensation comparison between the UO and our peer institutions. 

Total compensation at the UO compared to AAU peer institutions

Recognizing the university’s interest in attracting and retaining excellent faculty and United Academics’ interest in benchmarking faculty salary at the UO with the AAU averages, we have taken time to better understand how the university compares when factoring in cost of living and salary withholding for retirement and health care.  
This analysis shows that, when adjusted for retirement contributions, payroll deductions for health insurance, and cost of living, UO faculty total compensation is at 98.3 percent of the average of our AAU public peers. Key findings of the analysis include:
  • Higher institutional retirement contributions at UO compared to our peers reduce the amount employees need to withhold from their pay to accumulate retirement savings.
  • UO faculty members continue to pay significantly less for health insurance coverage than their AAU public peers.
  • The cost of living in Eugene is lower than average at our AAU public peers.

Retirement Savings Comparison

Higher institutional retirement contributions at UO compared to our peers reduce the amount employees need to withhold from their pay to accumulate retirement savings.  
Percent of salary withheld from pay to achieve a 16 percent of salary contribution to 403B retirement plan:
University of Oregon 
 4.00%
 Average at AAU peer institutions
 7.56%

The value of employer contribution to UO retirement benefits continues to be higher than at most of our peer institutions. In comparing defined contribution plans (Optional Retirement Plan at UO), the maximum employer contribution to a new faculty member’s retirement plan at the UO is 12 percent while the average maximum employer contribution of our AAU public peers is 8.4 percent. This means that an employee at UO needs to deduct an average of about 3.6 percent less from their salary to establish the same level of retirement savings as an employee at a peer institution. PERS, the defined benefit pension plan available to faculty, represents an even larger compensation investment, but due to the difficulty of comparing pension benefits across institutions, we have not included a comparative analysis of the value of PERS.

Health Insurance Comparison

UO faculty members continue to pay less for health insurance than their AAU public peers.
Average percent of salary withheld for health insurance:
At the University of Oregon
TTF and Career Faculty
1.28% 
 At average AAU public peer university
6.19% 
UO withholds 5 percent of a faculty member’s health insurance premiums from their salary regardless of which health plan and category of coverage a faculty member chooses. Our AAU public peers withhold an average of 19 to 25 percent of premiums from a faculty member’s salary depending on coverage category. This difference has a significant monetary impact on take-home pay comparisons. Taking into consideration both career and tenure-track faculty, the UO withholds on average 4.9 percent less of salary for health care benefits than our AAU public peers. It is important to note that the quality of health insurance is considered comparable, so faculty members at the UO are incurring less expense for comparable coverage when compared to their AAU peers, and the university is investing more financially in this benefit than other institutions.
Cost of Living Comparison
Cost of living in Eugene is lower than average at our AAU public peers.
It is important to adjust any comparative compensation packages for local cost of living conditions. When we were negotiating with the Graduate Teaching Fellows Federation earlier this year, we used the MIT dataset that the GTFF identified for this purpose. Our calculations at the time placed Eugene at 92.5 percent of AAU peer regions. That dataset includes calculations customized by family type. Given that more of our faculty are in larger family groups than the GEs, we recalculated the cost of living comparisons for this analysis at 95.1 percent of peer regions.
As the university administration considers salary increases in the next collective bargaining agreement (CBA), we take into consideration the health insurance and retirement comparators, as well as cost of living, so that total compensation is used to benchmark faculty earnings when compared to our AAU public peers. This analysis indicates that the UO is currently at 98.3 percent of total compensation for faculty compared to our AAU public peers.
Comparable Adjustment Factor to AAU Public Peer Institutions 
Adjustment Factor
Percentage of AAU Peers after Adjustment by Factor 
Starting point: Current UO TTF salaries
(fall 2022 data).
 
85.7% 
Health insurance: UO withholds 4.9% less from faculty paychecks than the average of AAU public peers. 
Divide by 0.951 
 90.1%
Retirement savings: Withholding from salary is higher for AAU peer faculty by 3.6% to obtain the same contribution to a defined contribution retirement plan.  
Divide by 0.964 
93.5% 
Cost of living: Based on MIT cost of living data, the cost of living for faculty at UO is approximately 95.1% of what it is at our AAU public peers.
Divide by 0.951
98.3% 
UO’s latest annual salary offer
The university’s latest salary offer moves the first-year increase to an across-the-board increase rather than a merit increase. The proposed three-year annual salary increases schedule is:
  1. Jan 1, 2025: 3 percent across the board
  2. Jan 1, 2026: 3 percent merit pool
  3. Jan 1, 2027: 3 percent merit pool

Next steps in bargaining

The university and UA bargaining teams will continue meeting this summer and into the fall to negotiate terms for a successor contract. Updates are posted on the HR website following each session, including proposals and counterproposals exchanged between the bargaining teams
We value our faculty and remain committed to working with the UA bargaining team to reach an agreement
Sincerely,
Christopher P. Long
Provost and Senior Vice President
Chris Meade
Director of Employee and Labor Relations

 

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