Not to be vulgar or anything, but I often do wonder about other people’s wages, and this one popped into my head. Does the going rate depend on the type of course being taught? If so, how?
Also do the professors get paid more if they are more distinguished amongst collegues (“Oh you know who that is, don’t you?”).
By “top universities”, I mean well established and highly rated institutions, such as Harvard, Oxford or MIT. Is the wage variance between the guys at these kinds of institutions and those professors at the more “lowly” institutions large? What I’m getting at is, does some professor teaching in Oxford earn more than his counterpart in Suffolkshire (made up name, but you get the drift)? If so, why?
I know it’s hard to be general about this (there’s probably a lot of variance even within universities), but if you could just toss out some ballpark figures, it’d be swell.
Extra Q for anyone who is a professor: Is it like a 9-5 job, or do you feel you have more freedom with it?
I used to be a professor, but now I do clinical work. At that time, in the early 1990s, pay at lesser known universities started at about 40,000 USD a year. At least that is what psychologists got paid; I don’t know if other fields paid more, although I doubt the pay was higher in the social sciences at least. Pay is not based on the numbers of classes you teach.
The reason big names get paid more (how much more, I have no idea) is because they draw students who want to study there. Higher admission rates and getting grants are the name of the game. I would guess that big name universities compete for big name scholars, and we all know what competition does.
I had tons more freedom as a professor than I do now in terms of work hours. On the other hand, if the work isn’t done, you have to work late or at home, or somehow get it done. So yes, you can leave at 2 if your classes are over, but you will make it up sometime.
This site looks like it’ll have a good bit of the information you’re looking for, at least for American universities. Specifically, yearly salaries at Harvard are $158k, $92k, $82k, and $52k for full professor, associate professor, assistant professor, and instructor respectively. For MIT the corresponding figures are $135k, $92k, $83k, and $52k. And for comparison, the national averages for private, non-church-affiliated institutions are $122k, $79k, $68k, and $45k.
For the UK, there’s a simple way to get an idea of salaries - look at vacancies on university websites
Oxford currently has lectureships ranging from £18k - £43k. No regular professorship is listed. (Note for Americans - ‘lecturer’ in a British university is equivalent to ‘professor’ in an American one - only the top people in each department get the p-word here.) There is little difference according to the quality of the institution - a random glance at London Metropolitan’s website shows lectureships at similar salaries.
I do know from my professor’s experience, that when you’re being head-hunted by an Ivy League institution, the pay offers soar way above the ‘standard’ rates already quoted. (And he still turned them down :eek: )
Yes, the “superstars” will get paid way more than that.
We had no less than four professors in the math department at the University of Texas who earned $250,000 a year. UT is a top 15 math department with a big endowment and high desire to build up their department. Also, during the boom years, the superstar economists were pulling in upwards of $300,000 at top institutions.
Academia is hardly a 9-5 job. My husband is a engineering professor and he’s working on research and class material all the time. Nights, weekends, you name it.
I work in a large public university. My department is one of the largest of its type around, and generaly highly ranked, certainly for research. Almost no one with the title of “professor” earns less than 80k and some of our big swinging dicks earn in the 180K - 220k range.
Working for the state, there are no secrets. You can see the whole USM salary guide online. People in the hard sciences like physics and engineering (and economics) do very well; those in history, english and the like not so much.
There is a lot more variation than has been listed here, a lot more. It also depends on fields, for example. Chem. Eng. is hot right now, Computer Science used to be. English Lit. has never been hot. So there could easily be $20k difference between junior profs at the same college.
I have it On Very Good Authority that the Ivy League schools are in fact tightwads compared to other similar schools. I’ve known Assistant Profs at Harvard in Computer Science during the CS heyday who were paid much less than I was. And they weren’t happy. Yes, Harvard brings in Big Shots for chaired positions, but the rest of the grunts, who do real work, are treated like crap.
Nitpick - “lecturer” is pretty much like an assistant professor, and “reader” is like an associate professor, and, from what I saw, a British professor is indeed a more rare breed than an American professor.
A few weeks ago our University released its annual list of over 100k salary-earners. Quite a few of my engineering profs were on the list (usually around the 100k - 115k range).
The University of Virginia has public figures, though they only go up to 2002.
The President of the University made $329,814 that year. I think the highest paid professor earned slightly over $200,000 (a well known Politics professor), but that’s from casual browsing. Check it out if you want.
Absolutely not a 9-5 job, which is one of the many reasons I love my job!
Re: Professor salaries, when it comes down to it, they’re all individually negotiated contracts. If you don’t have any clout (and starting off, you probably don’t), you’ll start pretty close to the national average (mid 40s) and after that, it’s up to you. Annual merit pay raises are linked to teaching, research, and service (with varying degrees of priority, depending on your institution–and it all might be moot, anyhow, if no Merit monies are available), otherwise pay raises are standard with the two promotions along the career path (assistant to associate, associate to full). Also, different fields typically pay more or less than the average–business, engineering, law, and medicine professors typically earn more than your average professor in arts and sciences.
I happen to be privy to some average salary statistics for a small religious-affiliated institution, but one that offers an array of degrees, including some engineering degrees.
For the university as a whole, last year, average salaries are $53k, $46k, and $38K for a full professor, associate professor, assistant professor, respectively. For the college of engineering, average salaries for the same three levels are $63k, $54k, and $48k.
Couple things to note here. First of all, engineering salaries are about $10k higher than the university average, which implies that there must be some other department(s) that are balancing them out; people who are making lower than the average, in other words. So even here where overall salaries are small, differences between departments probably reach as high as $15k or even $20k.
Second thing is comparison to industry salaries. Average assistant prof salary in engineering at this institution is $48k; this group of people have 1-5 years of faculty experience, all have a PhD, and some have additional experience outside of academia. $48k. My younger brother got his undergraduate degree three years ago, graduated middle of his class, and started out at $45k. He’s certainly making more than $48k now.
An addendum to Pantellerite - I’m a prof at a private Liberal Arts College, I don’t believe colleges have been mentioned in this thread. I am in the psychology department, and we (assistant, associate, full profs.) all have individually negotiated contracts. Most of us were farmed from larger universities based on area of experise. I was lucky to get in as adjunct after post grad work…I am the youngest on the psychology faculy staff at 34. Many are 20 years my senior.
I agree with Pantellerite - without the clout to negotiate a higher wage (usually happens to new professors so jazzed they are professors) you’ll start in the mid-40’s. As with my institution, I was immiediately asked to a salary negotiation meeting not a month after my change from Assistant to Associate Prof. There were many factors in my salary. I was planning on publishing a text with a collegue in my department, I was also involved with publishable research studies, and had opportunities with other area colleges for visiting prof programs. I was very gungho when I started. I have since calmed down a bit
Back in the 90’s I know that the average salary for associate professor at the University of Chicago was $72,000, this was 1995. I think it was in the school paper.
My uncle at the University of Hawaii makes more than that now, or so he says. However, he makes almost twice what he makes in the private sector (which he does on his off time or when he takes a sabbatical). Granted, he is department chair and has over 35 years experience.
I don’t know if I’ll be getting a “top university” position, but I can answer this: A large part of why I’m staying in the tower is the freedom of the hours. Say I teach two classes a semester. I have three hours a week of lecturing each and (say) schedule four hours for office hours (which is a bit generous, actually). That’s ten hours a week to have to be in any one place at a specific time. The rest I can do whenever and wherever I want. It’s convenient for me because I tend to work best between midnight and five or six.
Don’t forget the basketball coach. When I was there as an undergrad he was something like the second-highest paid state employee, even before performance bonuses.
Actually, this brings up a point: are we asking total income or university salary? A lot of the mentioned hard science or engineering earners include grants. I’m sure this is true for the Maryland stats posted earlier. At my institution, math professors and bio professors make almost the same amount from the university, but the bio department gets multibillion dollar government grants so their published salaries are a lot higher.
Every year, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) conducts an annual salary survey. It is quite comprehensive, although I do not believe it distinguishes between school rankings. The most current one can be found here: http://www.aaup.org/surveys/zrep.htm. The salary information begins about a third of the way down under Rank and Gender. Further down it breaks out disciplines.
