Salary Guide: Newsworthy Controversy or Talk Show Tantrum?

Our school newspaper, the UB Post, punblished in the February 2010 issue the "Salary Guide" which lists the salary of all "Faculty, Staff and Contingent II workforce as of January 2, 2010." I am not positive, but I believe this encompasses most of the employees at our school. Additonally,the guide from October 2008 was provided as reference.

I generally pick up the Post every month, enjoying keeping up on school news as well as reading the announcement bulletins. I was a little surprised when I saw the article, and glanced through it, noting the positions represented. They do cover pretty much everything from Dean to Professor to Administrative Assistant to Housekeeping. The guide lists the job title, first and last name, and what I presume to be "base salary" of each employee.

In the February 2010 issue, the editor writes that publishing the salary guide is accomplished through the freedom of information act, and that he fully understands that the decision to publish the guide will not be popular, but quoting President Obama, "I wouldn't just do what was popular." Mr. Flanagan also encouraged letters from readers expressing their own thoughts.

I took our editor up on his offer, and wrote a letter by email. He acknolwedged receipt (he apparently works on snow days!) and I was glad to see it printed in the March 2010 issue, which is currently available around the campus. It also contains a letter from Ms. Kristen Day, and Mr. Flanagan's response to both of our letters. Ms. Day expressed a very similar sentiment as myself. Since you can read both in the current issue, I am not going to go in depth here.

The first point I made, and the main thrust of Ms. Day's argument, is that few people actually care about these salaries, outside of the voyeuristic pleasure of knowing how much your math professor makes.