English Lit Salaries 2011-2012

Please indicate the following: School size, rank/position, starting salary, teaching load, geographical region, urban/rural, misc comments.

Please specify as well candidate status and job level: ABD, Post-Doc, TT, non-TT, starting Assistant, advanced Assistant, Associate, etc. since these factors influence salary levels too.

Would be interesting to see gender given that everyone says women receive lower initial offers and are less likely to negotiate!

For example: Research I, starting assistant prof., $54k, 2/3, midwest, small city, negotiated up from $53k

Back to English Lit 2011-2012

AY 2011-12 English Lit Salaries

 * Private institution, Canada. First year 2/2 teaching load, 53,400, moving expenses. 2nd year 3/3 teaching load, 54,600 and salary is frozen for 2 years now. No cost of living increase. PD money: 1800/year but cut this year 'unless you are presenting at a conference.' Female.
 * Private SLAC Midwest City, starting Assistant Professor, 51.5 (neg up from 50), 3/3, moving expenses reimbursed up to 2500, +technology, +travel money, female
 * Public state system (R2), midwest city, starting Assistant. 58K, 2/2 (1/2 first year), moving expenses up to 5K, computer, conference travel funds. Negotiated 6K research over 3 years, one semester guaranteed course relief. Also negotiated TT partner hire (same terms). Female.
 * Wow, this was brilliant. Well done! Getting spousal in this market is next to impossible, so you and your spouse must have been special for the Uni. to negotiate this deal.
 * thanks! it definitely wasn't anything we *ever* expected to happen; i think it was situational more than anything since it is, alas, no common thing to manage, even in better economic times than these.
 * that's fantastic, congrats! any tips on how you negotiated a TT position for partner as well as additional salary; etc? Most people I know have only been successful at one or the other
 * see below (i didn't nego on salary, tho, just research--and if i hadn't been doing the partner hire, i would definitely have asked for more salary and more leave time.)
 * Private SLAC, Northeast small town. Starting Assistant. 54k, 3/3, 2500 moving.
 * Private SLAC, western small town. Entry-level Assistant Prof. 45.5k, 4/4, laptop, conference funds, first semester course release. (Negotiated a bit on counting prior experience for a small bump on the salary scale.) Two X chromosomes. And now I can officially kiss the wiki goodbye!!!!
 * Private small regional university, northeast small city, starting Assistant Prof, 52K, 3/4 (2/3 prep), 3K moving, technology, $800/year travel. Negotiated salary up from 51K and free tuition for family. Female.
 * Public State U, Midwest City, starting Assistant Professor. 51K (negotiated up from 50K), 3/2, 8K in start-up funds (including moving/negotiated from 7K), semester off pre-tenure.
 * Public State U, small town, south, starting Assistant Professor. 48K, 3/3, first semester course release, additional start-up for first year, conference travel, computer, lectureship for spouse. Female. FYI, I had a competing offer for more money elsewhere but they still couldn't up salary. (Q: Was the teaching load better here? Is that why you took the job if you had a "better" offer elsewhere?) A: Yes; the other position carried a heavier load, in an area with higher cost of living.
 * Public State System, Northeast small city. Starting Assistant. 53,750 (negotiated up from 52.5), 3/3, laptop, $1000/year travel, $2000 moving. Female.

Questions / Comments
I'm curious about the salaries listed here, which all seem to hover in the range of 50-60K. Are there any yearly "bonuses" on top of that or are these base salaries? By "bonus" it could even mean a certain amount that goes to a pension or something of the sort. Excuse my naivete, but I'm preparing in case I need to negotiate a salary offer. I'd rather look stupid here than in front of a Dean or SC. The last query I have about this is regarding the actual take-home salary (after taxes). How much does someone actually end up with in cold, hard cash after taxes with a, say, 55K salary in a mid-sized town in Nevada or Texas? Thanks.
 * See also: English Lit Salaries 2010-2011 & English Lit Salaries 2009-2010 as well as 2010-2011 Rhet-Comp Salaries and Rhetoric/Composition Positions and Salaries 2011-12 for some comparisons and further information.
 * C'mon everyone, post your salary and benefits here! It's not idle curiousity--in fact, transparency in these matters *really* helps new faculty negotiating for the first time. If you want to not post the school's regional location just to make it less obvious who you are, that's ok too!
 * REALLY nice to see women negotiating!! It ain't fun, but it's gotta be done!! Way to go, double-X's! :)
 * hmmm...well, i'm not entirely sure i understand the question, but here goes: no, no bonuses for me, unless you count research funds, computer money, start-up funds, summer salary and the like, but most of those are either just reiumbursements or are temporary (i.e. first year only). some institutions have built-in annual or semi-annual salary increase systems and others don't; some institutions will have things like retention bonuses during the pre-tenure years and many won't. pension plans will also vary widely, depending on whether it's a defined benefit (as in some public institutions) or a defined contribution (as in most private institutions). i'd guess that the range of employer contribution to those plans would be between 4-6% annually or thereabouts, w/ a mandatory minimum employee contribution of about the same. and the taxes is a kind of impossible question, but, i dunno, federal taxes on an income of 55K if you have no spouse or dependents or other income is likely to be about 25%, and maybe add another 5% for state? i'm not an accountant, so take all this with a heaping spoon of salt. (also, FWIW: altho 52-62 is most typical, i think starting salary range is in the 42K-75K; that gives you the very bottom and the very top for a sense of the spectrum. check out last yr's salary page for more information.)
 * @poster above: I'm the naif who asked the salary question. Many thanks for your detailed answer. For better or worse, I've never held a real job other than university teaching, so I'm stumped by the intricacies of federal taxes, contributions, etc. It's hard to believe anyone can survive with a family on a salary of 42K. I'm terrified of being jobless AND of being subemployed. Is the fate of my generation to live in constant fear and anxiety?
 * it's true...before you despair too much, do bear in mind that 42K isn't really very typical--the 50-60 range is much more common, and your salary will increase, albeit slowly, as you gain additional professional credentials (tenure etc.). but it definitely ain't a fortune, especially if you have loans to pay off from undergrad/grad school. one other thing to inquire about in negotiations is housing assistance, i.e. faculty housing. housing subsidies, or mortgage assistance. this can really help, i think, esp. if you have a family. good luck--and don't forget that acquiring gainful employment, even if it's underpaid, is not at all a small accomplishment on this market!
 * Student Loans? If you're teaching at a university (or doing any of a number of other low-paid professions that fall under "public service") and have federally subsidized student loans, you qualify for IBR: not only will this lower your payment, you'll have the balance forgiven after 10 years. And time spent in economic hardship deferral counts towards that 10 year mark. Info: http://ibrinfo.com/
 * I wonder if anyone would share their experiences about negotiating positions for a partner/spouse?
 * Well, let me summarize my spousal nego story: I went from ABD to TT in an R1 univ, and I knew that the univ that hired me really wanted me. But I was a rookie and did all the mistakes a rookie possibly could do: because I was so fixated on finding something equitable for my spouse, I did not nego. on salary, course relief (admittedly, a 2/2 load is hardly onerous), moving expenses, start-up or any of those other terribly important things that you can and should inflect in your favour. My one hope and goal was that my spouse (R1 PhD, supervisor an international luminary in the humanities) would be given a TT (blank NO), or a CLTA/VAP for three years (we'll think about it, ask him to apply for this). On this ORAL semi-answer, I accepted the position, only to find three months down the line, that my spouse's "application" for the VAP was rejected (citizenship reasons, ostensibly). By then, I felt so betrayed that I refused to haggle for anything. My spouse thankfully (and in a real boost to our pride) found a great postdoc at a top institution but we have lived this past year in the kind of dislocated and disoriented way that many academic couples have come to accept as their lot. We have both decided to give the job market another two years to see whether we can find a place together in the same city or Univ. (even country would be nice!). So moral of my story: don't have a one-point agenda while negotiating; ask for more money at all times; ask for course relief, tenure clock reduction and all those other equally imp. stuff along with spousal, which may or may not happen, but which should certainly not prevent you from making the best of this situation for yourself as you possibly can. For the record, I have enjoyed my job, my colleagues, and my work a great deal; but this early disappointment doesn't quite go away.
 * i think one thing to bear in mind is that certain institutions just have a policy of not doing partner hires under *any* circumstances, while other sorts of institutions are quite wary of it (a small SLAC department might be worried that a couple would constitute a voting block in departmental decision making, for instance). anecdotally i think it is easiest with mid-tier, large-ish institutions not on the coasts (south, midwest, etc.)--places where the department really wants not only to hire, but to retain and where the location isn't highly desirable. what i did was to ask the dean on my campus visit whether there was an official partner hire program at the uni; if there isn't a program in place (thru which the dean's office will fund part of the position for a few years, and thru which the hire can be processed without going thru a separate search) i think it's an up-hill battle. and i've heard a *lot* of horror stories like the above about verbal promises turning into nothing, so i'd be *very* skeptical of anything not in writing (for starters because even when the will is there, the means may not be). i think the main thing is to try to either gain some leverage (a competing offer) or manufacture some (act as if you have a competing offer--not by lying, but simply by being coy--or consider whether you are willing to say you simply won't accept without the partner hire). and in general, be very, very happy if you can manage anything, because it gets more difficult by the year.
 * Does anyone have any advice/experience with negotiating with a school to sponsor your immigration when you receive an offer?