Workforce Pay Increases

CUPA-HR research is the most comprehensive, accurate, and up-to-date source of higher education salary data. Salary data are collected separately for administrators, faculty, professionals, and staff each year. The data on this page represent pay-increase trends over eight years by position type.

2023-24 Key Findings

  • Median pay increases for most higher education employees in 2023-24 continued the trend of the historically high pay increases seen last year.
  • This is the first year since the pandemic that median pay increases (for most employee categories) exceeded the inflation rate.
  • Non-tenure-track teaching faculty received their highest raise in the past eight years.
  • Staff (generally non-exempt employees) received the highest increase in pay in comparison to other workforce areas. This was true last year as well.
  • Tenure-track faculty continued to receive the lowest pay increases (and were the only group of employees whose raise did not surpass inflation).

Across higher ed, employees are still being paid less than they were in 2019-20 (pre-pandemic) in inflation-adjusted dollars. All higher ed employee groups are paid less in 2023-24 than they were in 2019-20 when adjusting to 2023-24 dollars. The largest gap between median salaries in 2019-20 adjusted to 2023-24 dollars and actual median salaries in 2023-24 is for tenure-track faculty (earning 9.7% less), followed by non-tenure-track teaching faculty (earning 8.2% less). The smallest gap is for staff (earning only 0.3% less). High inflation has only exacerbated the gaps in pay increases faculty (particularly tenure-track faculty) experience in relation to other higher ed employees. Further, even though most higher ed employee groups received raises that beat inflation in 2023-24, these raises did not reverse the erosion of higher ed employee purchasing power that has been occurring since 2019-20.

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Position Type

  • Administrators include senior level-positions (e.g., presidents, provosts, chief positions, deputy positions, deans, and department heads).
  • Professionals include those with specialized expertise generally requiring a college degree (e.g., librarians, IT professionals).
  • Staff include mainly non-exempt hourly positions not requiring a college degree (e.g., clerical staff, custodians, food service workers).
  • Tenure-track faculty include both tenured faculty and those on the tenure track, whereas non-tenure-track teaching faculty refer to full-time contract faculty not on a tenure track.

See the Survey Participation and Information Templates for all specific positions and disciplines included in these various facets of the workforce.

To view trends in pay increases for specific positions or groups of positions, subscribe to DataOnDemand.

Methodology

Inflation was calculated by measuring changes in the Consumer Price Index. Trend data was obtained by matching institutions that provided data in both (back-to-back) years of the comparison. First, average salaries were calculated for each position at each institution for each year of the comparison. Data were included in analyses only if an institution provided data on a particular position in both years. Then, the average institutional salary was calculated for each year of the comparison. The percentage change in average salary was calculated for each institution. Final analyses report median institutional change in average salary. The overall number of institutions analyzed varies with each comparison and ranges from 469 to 1,011.

Citation Information: CUPA-HR Higher Education Workforce Surveys

 

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