<p>Maddening. Absolutely maddening. We are having this huge financial crisis, and university presidents need salaries/benefits of close to $400,000??? And the trustees justify this by saying the higher salaries are needed to attract qualified candidates!!!
I am speechless. </p>
<p>At the same time, CSU is cutting enrollment to deal with the current funding cuts, beginning with a freeze on Spring 2013 admissions. They see that as preferable to large tuition hikes.</p>
<p>Another round of funding cuts and enrollment freezes, up to 6%, is coming soon if the voters reject Gov. Brown’s tax increase measure. And that’s the root of the problem. Higher education will get increasingly inaccessible and unaffordable unless the taxpayers come to believe, as they once did, that education is a public good which benefits all of us and is worth investing in. Executive salaries are maddening, but they’re not a drop in the bucket.</p>
<p>I have no problem with these salaries IF these presidents are leaders with vision who will be given the power/flexibility to do what’s needed to help these schools academically and financially. Paying the right people high salaries isn’t bad if they’re so good that they essentially end up creating the revenue that MORE than pays their big paychecks. </p>
<p>However, if these people are just going to be pricey figureheads, then pooh!</p>
<p>I heard on the radio that on top of the salary they get generous perks including a $60,000 housing allowance! $5,000 a month rent covered! </p>
<p>If they were worth that kind of pay, they would be able to either raise private donations to make up for the shortfall in state funding or find creative ways to cut at the Cal States without sacrificing the student’s experience.</p>
<p>Doesn’t this boil down to one set of education administrators deciding what other education administrators will receive as compensation? Do you think there could be any issues with that?</p>
<p>^^^ I think the market decides compensation. These administrators are by and large businessmen (if not by education, than by the requirements of the job) aware of their peers’ salaries in other states and in the private sector. And quite a few get offers from other schools which, if they’re not at least matched, often leads to their departures. It can take a year to hire their replacements, and the whole process can be very disruptive to the smooth running of a university.</p>
<p>^^ Then it’s a matter of supply and demand. Are competent administrators in such a short supply that it takes this amount of money to attract and retain one? Maybe they are - I don’t know the answer.</p>
<p>DW is an employee of CSU, she said the Unions gave them job protection, but on the othe hand, lots of unproductive employees are sitting around doing nothing waiting for retirement but the U cannot fire them.</p>