There’s a point in every debate about university finances where someone takes it upon themselves to argue that universities would be awash with cash if it wasn’t for an ever-growing army of pointless non-academics.
It’s both profoundly unhelpful and absolute nonsense. I’m not going to tell you what connects the kinds of people who make these arguments, but suffice it to say that they are generally not university administrators.
Wages – along with other employer-owned methods of establishing personal esteem – are an emotive subject at the best of times. During a sudden and startling rise in the cost of living, and during a long period where increases have not kept pace with inflation, it can feel very personal and very painful very quickly.
To help us get around that, allow me to introduce you to one of HESA’s lesser known open data releases. The “analysis of staff costs” (Table 12, HESA Finance) gives us average full time equivalent (FTE) academic and professional staff, and the amount spent on salaries and wages for these groups, for each provider in each financial year.
