Ivory Tower or Golden One?

Martin Kich of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) has actually done us a tremendous service with a recent blog post on the “Highest Paid Public Employee in Each State for 2017.”

Of course, his obvious purpose is to expose his bete noirs—college coaches. Fully three-quarters of the list drawn from an ESPN study is made up of basketball and football coaches. Nonetheless, we can still get a glimpse of the academic aristocracy from the roster.

Business Insider took the salaries and compared them to the governor’s salary and the media income in the states. Thus we learn that:

• Mark Holodick, the superintendent of the Brandywine School District in Delaware pulls down $246,000 a year in a state where the governor is paid $171,000 and the median household income is $61,017.
• James H. Page, Chancellor of the University of Maine system makes $277,500 in a state where the governor gets $70,000 and the median household income is $50,826.
• Clay Christian, Higher Education Commissioner in Montana, makes $309,000 in a state where the governor gets $106,167 and the median household income is $48,380. Big Sky Country indeed.
• Mark W. Huddleston, president of the University of New Hampshire, gets $492,000 a year while the governor gets $110,834 and the median household gets $68,845.

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