Overall financial picture must include workers
There are numerous factual mistakes in Brad Simmons '03's column on WROC appearing in the March 14 'Prince' — too many to cover in a short letter. Most glaring is Simmons' claim that Princeton's lowest-paid make well above the market rate. According to the University's own salary survey, food service staff make seven percent less than the weighted market average, and janitors make six percent less. There are of course other institutions that pay well above the average.
Aside from the factual errors, Simmons' argument is morally and philosophically inconsistent. Simmons casts the movement to pay workers a cost of living adjustment and to provide them with benefits comparable to other public institutions as motivated by charity. Treating members of the Princeton community with decency is not an extraordinary act of altruism or charity, but a responsibility.
Simmons also has a skewed perception of what Princeton's mission is, claiming, "At its core, Princeton is fundamentally an educational institution" whose "foremost objective is to provide the best possible liberal arts education for its students." It is clear, though, that Princeton does not follow this paradigm. Some recent examples include the purchase of 80 North Face jackets ($150 each) for Orange Key tour guides and the $500,000 gift to the Princeton public library and the construction of a $45 million stadium whose cost the University must pick up.
Indeed, Princeton's mission extends far beyond Simmons' limited model, according to its President. Harold Shapiro, no less, has argued that a Princeton education amounts to more than its purely academic component, and that the moral education of students is related to the way that the university treats its employees.
This is a time of great economic health for the University. Undergraduates can look forward to one of the most generous financial aid packages in the country; summer funding for graduate students has just been increased. It is inconsistent to resist an effort to provide a basic cost of living adjustment while some of Princeton's workers are struggling to make the most basic ends meet. Julia Salzman '02
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