Faculty salaries: Better, but not for all

Favorable compensation packages for faculty in the past biennium has allowed UW–Madison to improve its relative position among peer institutions at the assistant and associate professor levels.

Assistant and associate professors now receive salaries above peer averages. Assistant professor compensation is 6 percent above peer averages while associate professor pay is 7.3 percent above average.

However, compensation for full professors is still below the peer group average by 3.6 percent, according to the Faculty Senate’s Commission on Faculty Compensation and Economic Benefits, whose report the senate considered at its May 7 meeting.

Since 1973, the UW–Madison salary average has been lower than its peer average every year but one. Overall, the university average is about 5 percent below its peer group average.

The commission’s report notes a pattern in which salaries slowly fall behind those at peer institutions, catch up and then fall behind again. The commission recommended that the university break out of this pattern by ensuring that compensation at least matches the median of peer institutions.

The commission cautioned against salary compression in which salaries of full professors do not keep up with competitive salaries necessary to hire assistant professors. The commission urged that extra compensation somehow be located.