From the Daily Bruin … California state legislators announced a state constitutional amendment Tuesday that aims to restrict the University of California’s autonomy by reducing staff salaries, the length of regents’ terms and the authority of the UC president.
The proposed amendment limits nonfaculty salaries to $200,000 per year, which would affect coaches that, on some campuses, make millions of dollars, and administrators that make hundreds of thousands of dollars. The proposal also requires the UC Board of Regents to approve higher salaries in public hearings.
No sense in not having the state legislature tell the UC schools how to run there colleges…
Building on what @lemonlulu said, I would be interested in learning which coaches are actually paid more than $200k by taxpayers.
Also, it just occurred to me, are they suggesting that salaries for roles like President or Dean of Admissions be limited to $200k per year? That would be madness.
Athletic departments are usually self sufficient or use athletic fees/loans to make up the difference. There is no taxpayer money going directly to coaches salaries.
Athletic departments are usually self sufficient or use athletic fees/loans to make up the difference. There is no
taxpayer money going directly to coaches salaries.
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I’d be willing to bet the only profitable sports are men’s Football and Basketball at the high end. I’m not talking when the student fees contribute to sports. I’m talking about real revenue (TV and actual ticket sales) minus costs. Clearly the SEC is a football money printing machine, but I wonder about the smaller schools.
My kid goes to a FBS (Division I-A Conferences) school, but not one of the major conferences, and the stands are pretty empty. I don’t think he ever went to a game but he does “pay” for tickets. I did convince him to check it out next fall, especially on a nice day.
Back to the subject at hand, Can UCB and UCLA compete if they are subject to this limit? You might get a good young coach, but the turnover would be ridiculous.
Even the coaches in the lower sports (swimming, baseball) are making decent money. Many of the administrators make more than $200k. Lifeguards in California can make $200k!
I know that at Cal, whenever people complain about how the coaches make so much more than the professors, the justification is always that they are being paid from an account funded by boosters.
You can look up the salary of anyone at the public university in California on this site:
http://www.sacbee.com/site-services/databases/state-pay/article2642161.html
It displays what they were paid, so it won’t list current or agreed future salaries. As to the question of coaches being paid by booster, I don’t think that that is really accurate. If they are listed on the data base then they get a check by the state. Athletic departments do receive significant donations that goes toward everything in the athletic department from facilities, to transportation, marketing, etc… and can be targeted to sports or position. For most athletic department they get more support from the school then they bring in through donations but the number of coaches that make over $200,000 is limited to a the sport and the school. The vase majority of coaches are underpaid, including the number of unpaid or low paid assistants at Division II and III and even Division I programs that are minor sports not at flagship schools. I also think it also should be noted that while some of the positions are lucrative, at the high paid level the length of time a coach is in that position can be pretty short, because the expectation is great.
Interesting. I looked up Steve Alford, the UCLA coach, but he is not listed. However, his son Kory is listed and makes about $61k per year as a video coordinator.
California schools would really make a statement if they got rid football. “We’re in the business of developing minds. Not in the business of encouraging young men to destroy theirs.”
Jim Mora’s base pay at UCLA was $300k and his total pay was listed as about $3.5 million. Sonny Dykes at Cal was less on both figures. The data is from 2016, so newer coaches aren’t on there.
i would think pensions are one of the reasons it is such an important issue for the state. Maybe the goal is that there would be no more then 200,000 paid by the state on the books and anything above that would be paid in some separate fund like was mentioned. In the past coaches would have a base salary that might look reasonable but they often would make extra from summer camps. I know that can be challenging for the university with space during the summer at a premium.
It should also be noted that for probably 80% of the coaches at the state schools coaches are paid very low compared to the hours they put in. For years the coaches at UCSC were paid a stipend of a few thousand dollars a year. They finally received a bump to minimum salary but it probably still is far lower then the university employee. At one time coaches at many of the UC’s and CSU would move over to the community colleges just to earn a decent wage.
I understand the attack on football given that is where the brain injury data started (and rightly so), but data proves girls soccer is equally as dangerous, and now the winter sports are attracting attention as there are only a handful of helmet laws for skiing, snowboarding etc. In addition to the incidence of concussions in sports, the country has very inconsistent helmet laws for motorcyclists which means the conversation is much larger than football.
This part of the conversation is a bit off topic, but if we want to solve the brain injury issue, we have much work to do in many areas and that creeps into our freedom of choice.