Highest paid faculty receive 43 percent more than '95-96 salaries

The ranks of IU's highest-paid employees have grown by several more vice presidents -- and dollars -- in the past seven years.\nThe 25 highest-paid faculty and university administrators in Bloomington will collect a combined $5,556,046 during the 2002-2003 academic year. That is 43 percent more than the highest-paid group received in the 1995-96 academic year.\nThe federal consumer price index rose about 18 percent during the same seven-year period.\nBloomington Chancellor Sharon Brehm attributed the rising pay scales to competitive pressures.\n"If you are going to recruit, you have to offer salaries that are competitive," Brehm said.\nShe also said highly paid administrators are expected to make significant contributions to IU.\n"It is not a 40-hour week," she said. "You expect people when they are being paid a high salary like this to give of themselves in a very intense way."\nFor the first time, President Myles Brand's salary will top $300,000 at the public university. His $307,600 salary is below that of several other Big Ten university presidents, including Purdue president Martin Jischke's $335,425, but Brand will still earn 40 percent more than he did seven years ago.\nIn the 1995-96 academic year, 119 employees on the university's Bloomington campus and in the university administration earned $100,000 or more. Next year, 437 employees will earn more than $100,000.\nBrehm said some of the high salaries need to be thought of in comparison to other professions.\nA scientist at IU who earns $150,000, for instance, has not only put in years of study to earn a doctorate, but also likely worked several more years as a postdoctoral fellow in a university lab at relatively low pay.\n"They are in the educational pipeline for a very long time," Brehm said. "Compare their salaries to doctors. Post docs don't get a lot of money, just like interns and residents don't get a lot of money."\nPatrick Callan, president of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, said there is a growing trend nationally to see both the number of administrators increase and the gap between administrative pay and faculty pay widening.\nIf the trend continues, universities will be faced with having to either reduce pay or learn to get by with fewer people, he said.\n"Higher education is a labor-intensive business," he said. "What we pay people is the biggest driver of cost"