A living wage for graduate employees at the University of Illinois is both affordable and necessary:
The University’s Living Wage estimate for a graduate student is $16,086 for a 50% appointment on a 9-month service basis.
The campus minimum salary for graduate employees is $13,430. That figure is $2,656 below the University’s Living Wage estimate.
More than half of all graduate students live beneath the University’s Living Wage estimate of $16,086.
Graduate employees are essential to the educational mission and excellence of the University and are responsible for teaching 23% of all instructional units and 40% of all 100-level courses.
The minimum salary at the University of Michigan is $15,199 and at the University of Iowa is $16,575.
The cost to give 1,561 graduate employees a living wage is equivalent to the combined incomes of approximately 6 administrators (2.5 million dollars).
The overall budget for Global Campus – a program that educated only 366 students this year – sits at $9.4 million for the 2008-09 fiscal year. That is five times more than the total expense of giving all graduate employees a living wage.