[Vision2020] [Bulk] UI Fails to Meet Living Wage Requirement

[Warren Hayman]

I'm not quite sure how 80 % of progress equates to 80 % of employees. Sounds 
dangerously similar to mixing cardinal and ordinal numbers.

Warren Hayman

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Paul Rumelhart" <godshatter at yahoo.com>
To: <nickgier at adelphia.net>
Cc: <vision2020 at moscow.com>; "Thomas Hansen" <tomh at uidaho.edu>
Sent: Thursday, October 11, 2007 7:28 PM
Subject: Re: [Vision2020] [Bulk] UI Fails to Meet Living Wage Requirement


> Nick,
>
> I work closely with people in HR,  and know that the goal of getting all
> of our employees up to a living wage is an important one there, and has
> been for a while.  The devil, of course, is in the details.
> Specifically, who is going to pay for it.  I don't know where they are
> with that project, but I know it's being actively pursued and I know
> that the people working on it care greatly about it.
>
> Also, the memo states that 80% of the progress has been made adjusting
> our workforce to a living wage.  I take that to mean that of the number
> of employees identified as being below a living wage, 80% of them have
> been moved up to a living wage.  I have no idea if that's true or not,
> but that's how I read it.  Having 20% of our workforce below a living
> wage seems too large of a number to me.  That would be about 500 people,
> since we have somewhere between 2300 and 2500 board-appointed employees
> (I can't remember the exact number, and it changes weekly).
>
> I can agree that the administration seems to get the best raises.  The
> important question is: are we getting our money's worth?  I have no idea
> how to answer that one.
>
> Paul
>
> nickgier at adelphia.net wrote:
>> Greetings:
>>
>> I was looking for another story for the next issue of "Faculty Advocate," 
>> and here it is.  See the memo below from UI Financial VP about not being 
>> able to meet Moscow's living wage of $10.75 per hour.
>>
>> Almost 20 percent of UI employees receive salaries that are under the 
>> poverty line, and now many of them will have to wait even longer for 
>> their meager crumbs.
>>
>> Over 25 years UI upper administration salaries went up 274%, while full 
>> professor salaries increased 175%.  The Consumer Price Index for that 
>> same period was 202.  There were many years when faculty got raises and 
>> the staff did not, so I'm sure that staff are even further behind the 
>> CPI.
>>
>> A few years ago Idaho public employees had an opportunity to affiliate 
>> with the Service Employees International Union, the most progressive and 
>> fastest growing union in the America.  But the words "progressive" and 
>> "union" were just to much for a majority of these good folk.
>>
>> Some of you may remember my recent column on economic inequality.  It is 
>> alive and well at the UI.
>>
>> There is more than enough money in the raises the administration just 
>> received to bring staff salaries up to the Moscow City level of $10.75. 
>> That's Walmart's average wage, for God's sake!
>>
>> Workers of America Arise! You have nothing to lose except your chains!
>>
>> Nick Gier, President, Higher Education Council, Idaho Federation of 
>> Teachers, AFL-CIO
>>
>> Vice Provost Pitman and A-VP Johnson,
>>
>>  As you know we have made about 80% of the necessary university-wide 
>> progress during the last fiscal year to adjust our workforce up to living 
>> wage.  A great amount of that success came from internal adjustments as 
>> well as from recent pay adjustments from both the State and from the 
>> University.
>>
>> I promised you feedback not later than October of 07 as to if we could 
>> finish up the remaining approximate 20% that we have yet to  work and 
>> this correspondence is that feedback.  I apologize for being ten days 
>> late; however, I wanted to see for sure if we had any viable alternatives 
>> and it was worth waiting as long as we could for enrollment figures and 
>> any other potential alternative fund streams and so I took an extra few 
>> days.
>>
>> With the flat enrollment and the overall reduction of our appropriation 
>> this last year, from what we received the year before, it is not 
>> possible, at this time, to make those final living wage adjustments. 
>> However, we remain committed on this one and a lot of our capability or 
>> lack thereof will be predicated off of the Governor’s recommended pay 
>> adjustment and any specific constraints that will or perhaps not be tied 
>> to it, our own movement on our Health and Benefits and potential cost 
>> avoidance (which it is too soon to tell on this right now) and our future 
>> enrollment.
>>
>> I briefed the President today (and later, the Provost) and did recommend 
>> at the end of the brief to the President (and it was accepted) for us at 
>> University “Central” to do nothing at this stage on our potential 
>> remaining living wage adjustments.  We at “central” do not have the 
>> appropriated dollars at this time to funnel into this initiative.  He 
>> concurred and yet he too is aware of some of the parameters, that if they 
>> were to change in a more positive manner and  allow us to entertain this 
>> idea again in the near future.  Just today there was an article in the 
>> Spokesman paper on the same issue as it will remain a challenge for this 
>> part of our Country.  As you know, there is no mandated requirement to 
>> afford salaries that attain the living wage; however, it remains a viable 
>> objective for us to strive toward accomplishing.  We will continue to 
>> monitor and look for viable courses of action on this one.
>>
>> Not the news you would prefer and I understand that.  We will remain 
>> vigilant and aware on this as we move through the rest of the fiscal 
>> year.
>>
>> Lloyd Muse, UI Financial VP
>>
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>
>
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