New Bedford Guide Your Guide to New Bedford and South Coast, MA
I always found it shocking that thousands of state workers could make more money than the person with the most responsibility in the state. There is no one more powerful or oversees more people than the governor of Massachusetts. Two questions come to mind; how could that position earn so little and how could 2,700 positions earn so much?
When people complain that school tuition or taxes are so high, one just has to look at the sheer number of high salary incomes working for the state. Over 2,700 Massachusetts state government employees made more the the governor. In fact, over 1,000 UMass employees earned more than Governor Baker’s $146,837 salary. 19 of the state employees earn more than the President of the United States salary of $400,000, four of them earning twice the President’s salary.
All of the salaries for 2016 or later can be found online here.
Let’s start with the highest paid state worker; the UMass head football coach who earned $1.2 million in 2016. That’s more than eight times the salary of Governor Baker. How well did the team do in 2016? They went 2-10. Must be a rebuilding year? Well, they went 3-9 in 2015 and 3-9 in 2014.
The UMass head basketball coach had the second best income on the list earning over $1 million. The team was 13-12 for the season in 2016 and finished 14-18 in 2015.
The top non-sports UMass employee was a “Chancellor & SVP of Health Services” that earned $938,074, or more than six times the salary of Governor Baker. To put this even more in perspective, a fresh U.S. Army soldier earns about $20,000, so that chancellor makes 47 times an Army guy dodging bullets in Afghanistan.
A quick scan further down the list shows an Associate Dean that made over $752,000, a State Police Officer making $302,000 and a State Police Sergeant earning $272,000. I’m guessing the police officers are teaching or providing security, but either way the officer in making 15 times the salary on an Army guy dodging bullets in Afghanistan.
College education is important and we should value the teachers that educate our future workforce, but should you get rich doing it? Should over 2,700 state employees, 1,000 of them in the UMass system, make more than the chief executive of the state?
