An Objection to Equity in Pay Cuts for State and Non-State Employees

It makes no sense to cut salaries or furlough people who are not funded by state funds, thereby hurting them and the University’s larger mission, simply so that pain can be inflicted on everyone and all programs equally.

In addition, the great majority of people not funded by the state (non-FTE faculty and staff) have enjoyed little security because they are responsible for generating their own salaries from extramural and clinical sources. They have not enjoyed the security associated with an FTE and are quite angry about now being penalized in the name of “fairness” that they have not experienced in the past. (I am one of the few UCSF faculty with an FTE, and that FTE has already been substantially cut.)

University leadership also has to be frank with the public about the long term implications of the cuts that the Governor is pushing.

Unless the University wants to permanently reduce salaries (with the attendant loss in high quality faculty and staff), it will have to substantially reduce the number of students it can educate and substantially increase fees. CSU just announced a 20-30% increase in fees and a large reduction in enrollment. The President and Regents need to make it clear that any salary cuts and furloughs will be for this year only (and confined to state-funded positions, with corresponding reductions in services that the state used to provide to students and the state generally) and that next year there will be a combination of very large fee increases and enrollment reductions to get UC on a path to funding student activities at the level of 2001, the last year that UC was reasonably healthy and provided a reasonable quality education.

While I do not like advocating for this strategy of privatization, only by making the implications clear will there be a chance of avoiding it.

Stanton Glantz
Prof of Medicine (UCSF)
Past chair, UC Committee on Planning and Budget