Which professors make the highest salaries?

In case you missed this earlier, here’s a list of academic fields and what their faculty make, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education.

(Thought it might be appropriate during the current state budget talks on higher education.)

The top five fields for professors at four-year universities:

Legal: $134, 162
Engineering: $114,365
Business: $111,621
Computer science: $101,985
Area/ethnic/cultural/gender studies: $97,637

Here’s the full chart (with associate profs, assistants, etc.):

	Professor	Associate professor	Assistant professor*	New assistant professor	Instructor
Agriculture, agriculture operations, and related sciences	$92,716	$72,805	$62,122	$63,343	$45,057
Architecture and related services	$97,505	$74,466	$60,522	$57,510	$50,111
Area, ethnic, cultural, and gender studies	$97,637	$73,457	$58,282	$58,827	$41,776
Biological and biomedical sciences	$92,505	$68,806	$58,709	$57,272	$45,049
Business, management, marketing, and related support services	$111,621	$93,767	$87,248	$93,926	$57,873
Communication, journalism, and related programs	$85,057	$65,444	$54,303	$53,524	$45,070
Communications technologies/technicians and support services	$87,611	$65,162	$55,474	$61,840	$51,400
Computer and information sciences and support services	$101,985	$83,362	$71,760	$72,199	$53,356
Education	$83,748	$65,671	$55,848	$55,379	$46,183
Engineering	$114,365	$87,663	$75,822	$76,518	$57,678
Engineering technologies/technicians	$87,583	$72,351	$62,081	$62,516	$49,994
English language and literature/letters	$80,545	$62,077	$52,081	$51,786	$41,733
Family and consumer sciences/human sciences	$88,068	$67,934	$57,484	$56,259	$45,247
Foreign languages, literatures, and linguistics	$85,139	$65,759	$54,005	$52,968	$43,126
Health professions and related clinical sciences	$95,437	$75,207	$63,518	$64,943	$52,720
History	$82,202	$63,228	$52,626	$52,470	$42,318
Legal professions and studies	$134,162	$99,746	$84,374	$91,828	$64,785
Liberal arts and sciences, general studies, and humanities	$83,573	$63,098	$52,394	$51,568	$42,912
Library science	$92,099	$68,213	$55,015	$56,427	$47,253
Mathematics and statistics	$84,942	$66,263	$56,337	$56,647	$42,538
Multi/interdisciplinary studies	$92,148	$71,058	$57,645	$56,902	$47,435
Natural resources and conservation	$93,375	$70,470	$60,102	$56,070	$47,423
Parks, recreation, leisure, and fitness studies	$80,366	$65,072	$54,039	$54,444	$43,503
Philosophy and religious studies	$85,073	$63,998	$53,598	$52,270	$43,579
Physical sciences	$89,280	$67,590	$57,447	$57,607	$43,980
Psychology	$84,509	$64,892	$55,133	$54,859	$45,421
Public administration and social-service professions	$90,251	$69,791	$56,952	$58,230	$46,946
Security and protective services	$85,311	$66,094	$54,639	$53,769	$44,052
Social sciences	$89,858	$69,064	$58,436	$58,946	$46,158
Theology and religious vocations	$74,267	$59,593	$52,241	$50,620	$46,042
Visual and performing arts	$79,768	$62,686	$52,127	$50,618	$43,464

About the blogger

Alex Friedrich

afriedrich@mpr.org

Alex Friedrich reports on higher education issues for MPR News. Among the stories he has covered: the fall of the Berlin Wall, aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, collapse of the I-35W bridge in Minneapolis, 2003 Moscow suicide bombing and 2004 presidential elections in the Republic of Georgia. He holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Georgia and a master’s in European political economy from the London School of Economics.

Winte290

I would like to add complexity and context to the (somewhat misleading) data that has been presented here. According to the AAUP’s (American Association of University Professors) 2010 report on the condition of academic labor, over 70 percent of all “teaching” faculty are working off the tenure track (as adjuncts, research assistants, etc), often for salaries that are less than $3000 per class and without any sort of fringe benefits. It is important to note that the salary data that you have listed here is at the TOP of the salary range for tenure and tenure track (e.g. assistant, associate professors) professors, and that there is quite a range that exists between an assistant professor of English and an assistant professor in Engineering. The tenure and tenure track folks that the Chronicle of Higher Ed includes in their listing are a significant minority of teaching faculty in U.S. Thus, the answer to the caption of the picture that accompanies this article (“how much for this”–implying instructor salary) is, more often than not $3,000 for the entire semester, give or take… Here is a link to the AAUP’s most 2010 study: http://www.aaup.org/AAUP/comm/rep/teachertenure.htm
Anonymous

Definitely worth looking up in more detail. Are adjuncts considered salaried? And why would the Chron list “average” salaries if they’re at the top of the range? I need to get over to the Capitol, but would like to look at this further.
Winte290

Sorry for the confusion– I did not mean to imply that the Chronicle was listing average salaries because they were at the top of the range (my bad in not being clear in my posting), but that thinking about one national “average” for particular fields/disciplines obscures and flattens the differences that exist between disciplines and institution types (e.g. a community college versus an private, R1 institution). I have found that the Chronicle’s faculty salary interface http://chronicle.com/stats/aaup/ (which is drawn from AAUP data) is very helpful for making comparisons between institution types or regional areas. These comparisons are potentially more useful for the general public because they can see how particular institutions, states and regions compensate faculty.

Re: Adjuncts. The whole issue of adjunct/contingent/off-the-tenure-track faculty is very difficult to quantify because few agree on who/what “they” are and how they are/should be counted. Some institutions DO provide access to salaried/unionized positions for adjuncts, other places operate on a contract-by-contract basis. The AAUP did a study in 2006 that gives a great overview of this national trend and the implications of it for undergraduate teaching and learning. http://www.aaup.org/NR/rdonlyres/F05FF88E-B2A8-4052-8373-AF0FDAE060AC/0/ConsequencesAnIncreasinglyContingentFaculty.pdf