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Some Utah lawmakers are questioning whether high professor salaries — or other factors — are unnecessarily inflating the price of degrees from the state's universities.
Before deciding whether to approve the latest tuition increase sought by higher-education officials, the Higher Education Appropriations Committee will examine a list of professors' salaries, sorted by discipline.
Besides asking the Legislature for $77 million in taxpayer funds — a 9 percent increase — to keep the lights on and instructors paid in 2016-17, the CEO of Utah's public colleges hopes to raise the cost of what students pay by no more than 2.5 percent.
If the Legislature's budget makes room for that rate — just under the 3 percent increase OK'd last year — the semester payment for an in-state student taking a full credit load at the University of Utah would go up about $102, about the same as buying a physics textbook.
Some legislators on the Higher Education Appropriations Committee questioned Wednesday why the cost need go up at all.
"Most of it is personnel-cost driven," going to administrator and faculty salaries in order to attract top minds, said Higher Education Commissioner David Buhler.
For every dollar of a salary increase, taxpayers fork over 75 cents. Students' tuition payments cover the remaining 25 cents, according to the Utah System of Higher Education.
The instructor pay was a sticking point for Draper Sen. Howard Stephenson, who also is the president of the Utah Taxpayers Association.
"I'd like to know," said Stephenson, a Republican, "what are these professors' salaries?"
The paychecks depend on the subject, Buhler said. Competitive pay is needed, he said, to attract and keep cancer researchers and poetry lecturers alike.
Professors at Utah universities note academia is no place to get rich.
"There's this characterization of academia that it's a really cushy job," said Pierre Lamarche, chairman of Utah Valley University's philosophy department. Lamarche estimates most full-time professors work about 60 hours a week.
"If you're lucky enough to get a full-time job, a tenure track job, you're comfortable," he said. "You're not wealthy."
That is especially the case in Lamarche's department.
"It's been a long time since there's been a pay increase that's above 1 or 2 percent," said Elaine Englehardt, a Utah Valley University ethics professor and local board member of the American Association of College Professors.
Lecturers in the humanities can make a range of salaries, from $30,000 to $100,000 or so.
But as costs have risen and funding dipped, notes Lamarche, colleges have hired fewer full-time faculty and more adjunct professors.
Those part-time, hourly workers "are just overworked. They can't give personal attention to their students. That's the real problem," Lamarche said. "They're receiving no salary, no benefits. And they have absolutely no job security."
Yearly pay goes up significantly for medical school department chairs who may make up to $700,000, show publicly reported data on Utah's Right to Know website.
Stephenson and his colleagues will receive a full list with salary information by discipline before they convene in January for the 2016 legislative session.
Faculty pay, Buhler noted, is not the only factor driving up tuition costs at the state's eight public colleges. "States are putting less money into higher education."
The trend of reduced legislative spending on higher education has had a real effect on Utah students, who are shouldering about half the cost of college — up from the 25 percent share they paid decades ago.
"Had we had more funding" in recent years, "I'm sure we would've kept it to that" prior ratio, Buhler said.
In 2009, after the Legislature cut the U.'s budget by 17 percent, tuition went up nearly 10 percent at the state's flagship school, the University of Utah. But costs were rising steadily even pre-recession — the statewide 2015-16 tuition hike of 3 percent was the lowest average increase since 1996.
Last year, the U. raised tuition 3.5 percent, a half percent higher than other public colleges, resulting in a $120 boost to a semester's bill. Currently, U. students pay about $4,100 a semester for 15 credit hours.
Some on the committee Tuesday suggested lawmakers look inward.
Committee chairman Stephen Urquhart, R-St. George, indicated it is time for Utah to change course and invest more in its colleges.
"We can be better," Urquhart said. "We should be better. So let's work on that."
Buhler, on behalf of college presidents around the state, said the lower tuition increase is "in recognition of the families that are struggling to pay the bill."
If Buhler's plan for the 2016-17 school year is approved, the bulk of tuition dollars will go toward salaries and benefits for faculty and staff, scholarships, and a program that rewards schools for crossing off items from their own to-do lists, such as graduating students faster or enrolling more freshmen who would be the first in their families to graduate.
The Legislature will consider other higher-education demands next year. Individual schools also are sharpening their pencils and are set to make a number of costly requests.
The U., for example, is asking for $50 million in one-time funding for a new medical school building and rehabilitation hospital. The rehab space needs double its existing square footage, Buhler's staff noted in a legislative memo.
Lawmakers won't make any final decision until March, when the Legislature and governor sign off on the state budget.
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