By Joel Thurtell
“Trickle down” is a conservative economic theory that claims tax breaks and government gifts to top earners will somehow leech their way down to lowlifes at the bottom of the earnings scale.
Ever hear of “trickle up”?
Didn’t think so.
“Trickle up” is not a theory.
It’s a practice.
At Wayne State University, where I’m teaching a course this semester, the practice consists of giving giant raises to top administrators while paying for those pay hikes with even bigger cuts to the earnings of part-time instructors like me.
Here’s how it works. The WSU Board of Governors gave big raises to administrators, including an 18.2 percent pay raise to WSU President Allan Gilmour, His annual salary leaped from $347,000 in February 2011 to $410,000 in March 2012.
A $63,000 raise for the president.
On Monday, February 18, 2013, I learned that the compensation of part-time faculty such as me will be trimmed by 25 percent. My pay for teaching a semester-long class of four hours will go from $3,824 to $2,868.
Supposedly, Wayne State is adjusting the number of credit hours per class, but the bottom line is that I’ll be cut by $956 per course to offset President Gilmour’s whopping $63,000 raise.
WSU administrators are now negotiating an eight-year contract with the full-time faculty. Profs and administrators are still haggling over the details of compensation for full-time instructors.
If profs get a raise, we part-timers will be funding raises not only for administrators, but also for our full-time faculty colleagues.
Neat formula: Part-timers pay, and everybody else gets a raise.
We need a different term.
A $956 pay cut — a 25 percent cut — to fund salary hikes at the top is not really a “trickle.”
There’s a torrent of cash going from our lowly part-time pockets to the bank accounts of administrators.
If the profs get their raise, or even if they don’t get a pay cut, we part-timers will have subsidized the wallets of full-time faculty members, too.
