[joschmo]

$107K in Berkeley for someone with 2 kids won't lead to a lavish lifestyle in the hills, but it should be very doable on a budget so I don't quite understand that complaint. This reads a bit like someone who is used to a more elevated lifestyle in the private sector not understanding how middle or working class people live.

Is it the belief that someone who's entire job is teaching at a research oriented university should be paid similarly to those with greater academic credentialing (PhD) and who balance both teaching and research? That seems to be the implication here. And I don't disagree that teaching is undervalued, but Pamela Fox seems to want the higher status without the 5-6 year academic journey and brutal selection process to get tenure track positions. And academia doesn't reward great performance like the private sector so doing a great job as a lecturer would never elevate her to that upper track.

It is sad to lose great teachers but a part of me finds it hard to sympathize. This reads like a very smart person not doing their homework on the way a system works though ample public resources are available to find out.

[Certhas]

I see where you are coming from with this, but isn't everything actually addressed in the post (even though it's not the focus)?

She wanted to try academic teaching, took a pay cut for it, tried for a couple of years, and is factually describing that it's undervalued and exhausting work, even though she has a passion for teaching. Useful info for people thinking about it. Maybe also useful info for people who want to improve academia.

No grand systemic changes are suggested or requested in this post, nor is she asking for sympathy as such.

As a European the salary levels seem very high (top level professor in Germany starts lower than that), but the conditions (maternity leave, health care) are unbelievably atrocious.

[interblag]

I see where you're going with this, but a reasonable counterpoint would be that this is a CS teaching role. Most people with the skills to teach university level CS, who also live in the Bay Area, can probably earn much more than $107k/year, which is the choice she's clearly making as well. I'd also note that, from my read, she's not saying it's immoral or anything, she's just saying "I could personally earn more, so I'm leaving"...

[dataflow]

A $107k/year salary is around $76k after taxes.

I'm Googling and here are a couple of numbers I find:

- Median rent in Berkeley seems to be around >= $3k/mo for a ~700 sq. ft. (2-bedroom?) apartment. [1]

- Family of four estimated monthly costs are ~$4.5k without rent. [2]

I don't know how accurate that estimate is, but it's around $90k/year in expenses, which is $14k more than the post-tax salary.

Curious what your numbers are that suggest this is pretty doable. Of course I'm sure there are people scraping by with much less, but it seems like doing so would need a fair bit of creativity and not be something that would seem "very doable".

[1] https://www.rentcafe.com/average-rent-market-trends/us/ca/be...

[2] https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/in/Berkeley

[pamelafox]

I can give my actual numbers - my mortgage is around 3K/mo plus property taxes. Nanny is $3600/mo. I have another baby coming in a few weeks, so my childcare next year will be an additional $1800/mo for the older one to start preschool. My partner and I split most costs.

We recently bought a house, so we've had some home maintenance costs, which was the big issue that popped up this year - I didn't have the money to split roof-fixing costs, and a big rainstorm caused a leak which caused us to have to tear the drywall out of our bathroom wall. I look forward to having a bathroom wall again in the near future! :)

To the original comment: I agree that my salary was doable (and higher than many Unit-18 lecturers! and than many in the bay area! I am quite fortunate indeed). However, given that I am able to earn much more as someone with a CS background in other roles that I also enjoy, I made the decision to leave the lower paying role.

I did do research this year, by the way, as I managed to get a grant even as an adjunct lecturer. That was one of the things that added to the courseload. The other Unit-18 lecturers in EECS are also involved in research.

Hopefully my reflections make it easier for others to do their homework. :D

[secabeen]

The Unit 18 union has done a pretty good job across the UC in making it possible to be a temporary lecturer for a few years as a viable part of a career path. It's not a permanent job, and the costs of living have gone up quite a bit more than either the union or UC projected when the contract was last negotiated. All that said, compared to the pittances that adjuncts are paid at other Institutions, it's a lot better.

[cycomachead]

This is true, but it also sucks if we assume "part of a career path". That means there's virtually no teaching-focus career paths in the UC system which is terrible for basically everyone. (Students as well as other faculty.)

In reality, there's spots where it very well could be a career path but it's incredibly difficult to make it work in CS. (And in many many other fields too!)

[secabeen]

Yeah, this is largely true. Teaching-focused career paths in California Higher-Ed would be at Cal State or the Community Colleges. UC is about research, and expects all faculty to focus on research, although there are some continuing lecturer positions here and there.

[sweezyjeezy]

For more perspective, it's probably double what they would get for similar role in Europe, insane to me that it would require 'budgeting'.

I also feel like there will be some tension between increasing wages to be competitive with SWE salaries and the staggering tuition fees that students pay in America (orders of magnitude more than their EU counterparts in comparison).

[cycomachead]

The fact of the matter is that it wouldn't even necessarily need to increase tuition. The UC system is a $50bn/yr enterprise. Lecturer salaries are a tiny amount, and really only about 20% or so of tuition money right now is directly attributed to instruction costs. If the University worked on a budgeting model that valued instruction, then I think the pay gap could be significantly reduced.

[dataflow]

> it's probably double what they would get for similar role in Europe

Out of curiosity, how much do you believe it would be in Europe post-tax? In California this would be around $76k.

[sweezyjeezy]

This is UK-centric, but this is more like what you would expect a tenured professor to make at a top university, full time teaching roles I think would be in the $25-$40k range post-tax. I know that salaries vary and especially in Switzerland and you can earn a fair bit more, but I think that range would be fairly typical/high for most of Europe.

[dataflow]

A couple of questions come to mind:

- Are costs of living (including housing prices) comparable?

- Is retirement comparable?

In the US you need to try to save some of your money for retirement too; not sure if most European countries have a pension-based system or not, but that's another thing to account for.

[searchableguy]

> not sure if most European countries have a pension-based system or not, but that's another thing to account for.

Even if they do have generous plan on paper, can they actually pay that 50 years in future?

Most won't. I know people from southern EU who haven't received what they were promised for pension and live in poverty today. It's only worse for future pensioners while they tax 25-30% in social security with no cap from your salary for pension and healthcare (You still need private coverage on top).

They also cut pension for people who saved money on side and accrued a livable amount ignoring their past contribution.

[barry-cotter]

> Are costs of living (including housing prices) comparable?

No. The US is far and away the richest polity on Earth. Nowhere pays comparably.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_househo...

[qsort]

As far as retirement goes, government-run pension systems are funded by taxation, so that's kind of a moot point if you're comparing pre-tax salaries. Also in most cases the government pension is not a living wage, so most people have private pension funds in addition to the mandatory public system.