UC FACULTY ASSOCIATIONS OPPOSE PROPOSED
CHANGES TO UC PENSION PLAN
This
is the statement released today by the Council of UC Faculty Associations
(CUCFA). A link to their petition can be found below.
The University of California is currently considering introducing a new pension plan for its employees hired after 2016. These proposed changes will dramatically reduce pension benefits for most new faculty. The Academic Senate will be reviewing the proposals over the next few weeks. Your opportunity to provide input to the Senate lasts just a couple weeks. For some purposes, it will be most effective to provide input this week. Contact information is at the end of this document.
This
ill-conceived and ill-advised plan, which was negotiated behind closed doors by
President Napolitano and Governor Brown without any engagement with the
Academic Senate, the Regents, the Legislature, or the larger university
community, will do serious damage to the quality of the University of
California.
While
the details are highly technical the
implications are not:
1)
This is a serious cut in benefits to faculty and many other professional staff,
such as staff scientists and nurses, hired after July 2016. (See pages
44, 45 and 84 of the task force report.)
2)
UC faculty are already much more poorly
compensated than faculty at UC's peer institutions despite the
fact that the cost of living in most parts of California is very high. This
plan will make it much harder to attract faculty and other professionals and
keep them here.
3)
This plan does not do anything to make the existing pension system healthier
and could actually decrease the rate at which the unfunded liability is
retired. (See page 57 of the task force
report.)
We
agree with the assessment of Academic Senate leaders J. Daniel Hare and James
A. Chalfant's analysis,
who concluded:
"If
salaries don't increase to compensate for these reduced benefits, then UC will
have to settle for a lower-quality of faculty who did not receive better offers
elsewhere. Many UC faculty members were hired in spite of more lucrative salary
offers elsewhere, just as many have either declined outside offers or declined
to pursue them. It may have been true at one time that benefits made up for our
uncompetitive salaries. The 2014 Total Remuneration Study showed that no longer
to be the case. While salaries and benefits continue to lag, and we are
contemplating making the lag even greater with the new-tier options, it is
important to note that most of the non-pecuniary attributes of UC employment
also are declining."
As
Academic Senate Chair Dan Hare stated in his remarks to the Regents in
September:
"Any
reduction in either salary or benefits surely will have consequences for the
ability of UC to build and retain a future faculty that is as distinguished as
the current faculty. As recommendations are brought forward in early 2016, I
encourage the Regents to carefully consider not only the budgetary cost of
future retirement options, but also their impact on how faculty members behave
in terms of recruitment and retention. If we are not careful, small budgetary
savings will risk far greater costs to the University, our students, and the
citizens of California."
We
urge you to sign our petition to
express your opposition to proposed changes to the UC Retirement Plan. We will
forward the names of those that sign to local campus faculty welfare committees
so they are aware of local concern about this issue.
UCOP
has also set up a comment link where
you can provide your feedback on the task force recommendations. We urge you to
express your concerns about the plan there and please also send a copy of your
comments to us at newtier@cucfa.org.
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