U. to cut employee benefits following raise reductions, eliciting mixed reactions

In a series of February memos, the University informed faculty and non-union staff of raise cuts and benefit reductions for the coming fiscal year, with a decrease in personnel also on the horizon.

The adjustments to employee pay and benefits came shortly after the annual State of the University letter from University President Christopher Eisgruber ’83 reported that the University would be tightening its budget primarily due to declining long-term endowment return expectations and continued uncertainty over federal funding. Eisgruber discussed some of the raise cuts at his annual Council of the Princeton University Community town hall on Feb. 9.

On Feb. 18, Provost Jennifer Rexford ’91 and Executive Vice President Katie Callow-Wright sent an email obtained by the ‘Prince’ to employees informing them that benefits would also be cut.

“We want everyone to be aware that some reduction to the University’s generous benefits structure is coming,” Rexford and Callow-Wright wrote. “Overall headcount at the University will decline as we reallocate resources to protect our highest priority areas,” they also warned.

The email did not specify whether this referred to layoffs or not renewing positions after retirements.

According to a memo sent by Vice President for Human Resources Romy Riddick on Feb. 4, many non-teaching staff will receive an across-the-board 1 percent salary increase regardless of performance, unlike previous years where raises were determined by merit. Members of the President’s Cabinet and recently hired employees will not receive a raise.

Riddick clarified that union employees, including public safety and security officers, cogeneration plant employees, library assistants, and hourly service employees in dining services and building services, should follow their contracts and are exempt from the across-the-board fixed salary increase.

A Feb. 6 memo from Dean of the Faculty Gene A. Jarrett ’97 informed faculty that assistant professors, instructors, and lecturers would still receive salary raises based on “a modest merit pool.” Associate professors, full professors, senior lecturers, University lecturers, and professors of the practice will not receive salary raises in the next fiscal year.

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According to a review of Department of Education statistics conducted by the ‘Prince,’ non-instructional University staff, including union staff, received an average raise of 3.67 percent on average for the 2023–24 year. Faculty salaries increased by 5.57 percent on average between 2024-2025 and by 6.45 percent on average between 2023–2024.

Exceptions to this year’s raises will be given from a “special merit pool” for “faculty who receive raises for a promotion, retention, or professional achievement,” according to Jarrett’s memo.

“We anticipate a return to more typical salary increases after next year, assuming we can address the benefits costs,” Jarrett added.

In the email about cuts to benefits, administrators cited “dramatically rising costs of medical and prescription benefits here and nationwide.” They said that staff could expect to learn more before the open enrollment period for the next academic year began.

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A University spokesperson declined to comment about any of the policy changes.

Many administrative staff expressed disappointment over the raise reduction, while faculty reactions ranged from frustrated to supportive.

“I’m disappointed that hard-working staff are not getting a merit increase, when just a few months earlier the University announced that families making up to $249,000 are not having to pay tuition,” Keisha Craig, an events and office coordinator in the philosophy department, said. “My income is nowhere close. That’s not a low-income family, it’s very disappointing … Hard-working staff are being asked to do without while [these] kids get free tuition.”

Another staff member, Anna Faiola, the philosophy department manager who has worked at the University for 42 years, recalled that similar cuts were made following the 2008 financial crisis, where the University endowment dropped 22.7 percent. “It was very scary because a lot of people were being let go,” she said.

As academic professionals, physics senior specialists Jackson Puchalla and Andrew Bazarko were also subject to the one percent raise policy. However, both said they understood the rationale behind the decision.

“It’s a complicated environment right now, on many levels,” Puchalla said. “There are certain levels where we all have to work together to make the system work. I’m willing to be in the position that I’m in.”

Bazarko told the ‘Prince’ that the salary changes were “perhaps not unexpected” due to federal funding cuts that the Trump administration issued last year. “Telling faculty they get no raise at all, I see that as sort of [saying] everyone’s in this together,” he said.

Kai Mesa, an assistant professor in the molecular biology department, said that he was mostly disappointed and concerned on behalf of the staff in his laboratory, whom he believed would be unfairly harmed by the policy.

“It really impact[s] people that work in my lab. [There’s] this feeling that this is a massive or an unexpected financial burden for people at the University that, on average, compared to faculty and higher-ups in the University, are relatively making much, much less,” Mesa said.

“I’m not upset,” tenured physics professor Robert Austin told the ‘Prince.’ “The University is under a lot of financial pressure right now [due] to the Trump administration. I understand why they’re doing that, and I’m glad they’re giving raises to the assistant professors.”

Tenured religion professor Seth Perry shared Silhavy’s and Austin’s perspective.

“I’m very proud of how Princeton is handling relationships with this administration,” he said. “And if this is the kind of sacrifice that we’re making at this point, benefits and salary, then I think that’s just what we’ll have to do.”

Fellow religion professor Garry Sparks and classics professor Ilaria Marchesi were less supportive of the administration’s decision.

“I understand that there are measures that the University sometimes has to take, but the fact that we don’t even have an adjustment to the cost of living is worrisome, especially given [that] they are also diminishing our benefits,” Marchesi told the ‘Prince.’

Both Marchesi and Sparks also felt that the changes to faculty salaries disproportionately affected those in non-STEM fields due to salary disparities between disciplines.

“If you’re humanities or non-quantitative social sciences, you’re already making less than, in my case, associate professors in the [STEM] fields. So, I think at that level, [the cuts] sort of pinch more,” Sparks said.

“We’re all putting in the same amount of hours. We’re all trying to get published,” he continued. “[But] faculty in humanities usually aren’t submitting patents. We don’t have other sources of income like our peers in STEM.”

Marchesi also said that she felt there was “a huge discrepancy in salaries” between STEM and humanities professors which the University should have accounted for.

“Humanities professors should have at least [received] an adjustment to the cost of living. [Faculty] in the other disciplines can live better, even if for one year they don’t get a raise, because they are earning much more already.”

Perry pushed back against concerns regarding salary discrepancies.

“Look, we teach at Princeton, it doesn’t get better than this in terms of salaries,” he said. “And any [faculty] here who really wants to complain about that at this moment needs to reconsider their priorities.”

Leela Hensler is a staff News writer and a staff Sports writer for the ‘Prince.’ She is from Berkeley, Calif. and can be reached at leela[at]princeton.edu.

Please send any corrections to corrections[at]dailyprincetonian.com.