Editorial: Faculty salary demands add up only to hype

Indeed, University of Arizona professors are actually getting quite a good deal.

The average professor at the University of Arizona, on a nine-month, full-time contract, makes $72,248, according to a 1995 survey. A study done by the University of Washington, comparing the salaries of professors there with those at Michigan, North Carolina, UCLA, the University of California at Berkeley, Illinois, Indiana and Oregon found that those universities paid their professors in the arts and sciences an average of $67,406. Engineering professors averaged $84,493 and computer science professors averaged $85,504.

Arizona's $72,248 is hardly out of the salary range of these peer universities.

In fact, Arizona's lower cost of living easily makes up for any difference in salary. Tucson's cost of living is just under the nationwide average, whereas Seattle's cost of living is 115 percent the national average. Consequently, the average salary of $72,000 in Tucson is equal to a salary of $82,000 in Seattle.

Not surprisingly, the average salary for a nine-month, full-time professor at the University of Washington in 1997 was $84,000. Not a significant difference.

It also deserves to be pointed out that the University of Arizona is not the most prestigious of these peer schools. While we may aspire to be, the hard, cold fact is that the University of Arizona is not in the position to be commandeering the most highly sought-after professors.

There are complaints that most of the faculty members who have left the university did so because of "salary" reasons. This has no meaning by itself. For example, how many faculty members leave other universities for "salary" reasons?

It may be the most common reason across all universities why faculty members quit their jobs. Without examining similar surveys from other universities with comparable salaries, these numbers are meaningless.

Not surprisingly, the University of Washington study on professor salaries was done in reaction to concern about low salaries. Obviously, complaining about low salaries is not

particular to just the University of Arizona, contrary to all the hype.

We hold in high esteem the professors at this university. We believe they are well-compensated for their work. And we think most - professors and students alike - will agree with this assessment if they examine faculty salaries in light of Tucson's cost-of-living and the salaries at universities comparable to ours.

And, of course, if faculty members don't appreciate the highly competitive salaries the University of Arizona offers, they are free to find another university that will shell out more bucks. Most universities aren't located in sunny, smallish cities with character like Tucson.

If faculty members would prefer to move to some gray, freezing small town located in hootsville, to work for a high-paying private university, let them. Or if they choose to move to some smog-laden, traffic-congested, heavily-taxed, crime-ridden metropolis nightmare to receive $5,000 more a year at a different public university, so be it.