Thread by @DrBritWilliams

I am seeing a massive number of higher ed jobs with salaries under 30,000.

It’s 2021.
Everything costs more generally but even more so BC of the panoramic.

Has anyone considered how completely unethical it is to offer this substandard salary generally but especially now??

The worse part is, some of the salaries *for full-time employment* are similar to those of graduate students who only work part-time AND report they can't afford to live off these salaries?

The burden and disparities this is and will continue to cause higher ed are profound.

For one, most first-gen and low-income graduates cannot afford to exist with these salaries when they have no social safety net. That means your applicant pool will be full of people who can afford to take a low salary for "experience" because they have other resources.

For two, if your argument is graduate students deserve 25k stipends because they work 20 hours, doesn't that mean your MINIMUM salary should be 50k for a full-time role? Or does this only work one way when it's convenient?

Third, this is going to contribute to the number of people working at/ serving in college environments who are food/housing insecure. We talk more about this with students, but there are EMPLOYEES with FULL TIME jobs who used campus events with meals to supplement their low pay!

Higher ed campuses can find all the money in the fucking world for stadiums and gyms. You can raise money for visually appealing campus spaces. But you can't say to your donor base: We are losing our best people due to low salaries and they're going to our competitors?

Or is that you all got together and decided we're going to lower compensation across the board?

I understand things are scary. Campuses are in financial peril. But you could LITERALLY improve morale by paying people a living wage. Its cheaper to retain than constantly hire.

I am also seeing an influx in "INTERN" positions that used to be entry-level HESA roles. They come with benefits but pay minimum wage. You want masters level professionals to INTERN at minimum wage AFTER the Masters where the learned to do the thing already? Seriously?

And the most abusive part of all of this is-- people have no choice but to take it. People have done everything they've been told to do. Everything they were supposed to do. And we are pulling the bottom from under them and creating a dynamic where they HAVE to figure it out?

Why? To keep paying the folks at the very top more?

I had a low starting salary in this field and I rationalized it BC it included housing. Because it was more than my parents ever made.

I WAS HUNGRY AND AGITATED AND STRESSED ALL THE TIME.

I roll my eyes a LOT when people talk about some of the things I do now or have now.

Designer bags? Bought with a retail discount. A retail job I had to SUPPLEMENT my FT post-masters roles. Travel? Points from paying for all my student programming on rewards cards.

These institutions are constantly abusing and misusing folks. The more we are hush about our salaries the more an employer wins. The more we fail to organize and demand better? The more the systems win. And it's an ongoing reproduction of inequality that campuses thrive off.

Because realistically: WHO HAS THE RESOURCES TO OPT-OUT? Who can turn down a salary that is too low when they just need a pay check or to put food on the table or HEALTH INSURANCE?

This is how intergenerational poverty is reproduced irrespective of educational attainment.

When I was on the market, there was a TT role advertised as a "9-month contract at $58,000 (little to no room for negotiation)." I'll never forget it.

That was the day I told my parents I would not have a job in the South anytime soon, & I would have to commute (fly) to them.

We have a teaching crisis in the U.S. in part BC of resource issues /& low pay. I guess higher ed wants to be in that mix.

Dear #HESA #SAgrads on the #SAsearch to be an #SApro: DO NOT TAKE THAT SUBPAR SALARY unless you ABSOLUTELY have to. If you do, job search after 1 year.

Do not listen to anyone tell you that you have to stay for two years too. That's a scare tactic.