The number of Carleton employees whose salaries exceed $100,000 has increased again, according to Ontario’s Public Sector Salary Disclosure list, which was released March 27.
The Sunshine List has been published annually since 1996 and lists the salary and benefits of every public sector employee making more than $100,000 in the previous year.
The total number of employees in the university sector fell five per cent from last year. Despite this, 735 Carleton employees made this year’s list, an increase of approximately five per cent from 698 in 2013.
Carleton president Roseann Runte is the highest paid employee at Carleton, making $355,268, with an additional $49,069 in taxable benefits, for a total of $404,337.85 earned in 2014.
Following Runte in order of highest-earning are: Duncan Watt, vice-president (finance and administration) who made $273,061.96; Peter Ricketts, the provost and vice-president (academic) who made $251,698.85; Kimberly Matheson, vice-president (research and international) who made $228,228.75; followed by the deans of each faculty. Dean of the Sprott School of Business, Jerry Tomberlin earned $222,258.65, the highest income among the Carleton deans.
The highest-paid professor at Carleton is Isaac Otchere, who teaches finance in the Sprott School of Business, and earned $196,101.60. The second highest is Michael Wohl, a professor of psychology, who earned $190,409.20.
Chantal Dion, president of the Carleton University Academic Staff Association (CUASA), the full-time faculty union, and a French professor, said she thinks professors are valuable employees on the list. Dion is the 465th highest paid person at Carleton, earning $121,848.32 in 2014.
Dion said there are bigger priorities for many professors than earning a high salary.
“The Sunshine List is not important. What’s important is if I get a grant to do my research,” she said.
“Professors don’t use the money they get for fun,” she said, referring to the grants many professors receive to do their research. “We publish, we are assessed and evaluated by our peers, and we attend conferences and write books. It’s worth something.”
There is a disparity between female and male employees at Carleton on the list. Female employees make up less than 20 per cent of the top 100 earners at Carleton. This is comparable to the entire Sunshine List, 21 per cent of which is comprised of women.
However, female employees make up 63 per cent of the public service at all levels of government in Ontario, according to February 2015 employment data from Statistics Canada.
Runte falls right in the middle of the top 100 highest earning university sector employees in Ontario. She makes less than the presidents of University of Ottawa and Ryerson University, and more than the presidents of Brock University and the University of Ontario Institute of Technology. She is also the highest paid female university president in Ontario.
Two university sector employees made almost $1 million last year. The president and chief executive officer of the University of Toronto Asset Management Corporation (which manages the university’s endowment fund), William Moriarty, made $937,500 last year, and the president and vice-chancellor of University of Western Ontario, Amit Chakma, made $924,000. They rank third and fourth-highest earners on the entire public sector list, respectively.
“I’m convinced education is worth the money we pay, but tax payers aren’t,” Dion said, referencing rising tuition costs. “Everybody who has invested in university is worth a penny and a half.”
Dion also said people should not be quick to dismiss the income of professors as too high because academics are not making something obviously tangible or useful.
“Knowledge is such a gift,” she said. “Sure, professors aren’t making cars, but we’re making brains.”
To see all the Carleton employees on the Sunshine List, click here.
