The Furlough Fandango July 30, 2009
First I wish to say that I can accept a pay cut in the context of the fiscal
disaster we inherited from the Bush administration. However, I cannot
accept the furlough game that is being imposed on all State employees.
I have been a full-time faculty at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse for
the past 31 years and while I have, on previous occasion, had a zero pay raise,
I have never had a pay cut until now. All that I am asking for is honesty
and truthfulness from the Governor and the State. What is happening in the
2009-2010 fiscal year is that my colleagues and I are receiving a 5 percent pay
cut whether we like it or not. This is a fact that cannot be
disputed. How so? Well two years ago we were given a biennial
contract that specified a modest raise that included a 2 percent increase in the
second half of the current year. This has now been rescinded. In
addition to that we are mandated to take a furlough pay cut of 3 percent of our
annual salary for this year and the next year also. A furlough, by its
classic definition, is “a vacation granted to a military man [of one month
duration]”. Furloughs are in this traditional context not imposed and do
not involve any pay cuts. What is now being imposed is not voluntary and
very simply is a uniform pay cut. We are here required to select
(voluntarily) those days for which we will exercise our furlough; however, we
are not allowed to select any days during which we are officially required to be
at our place of employment. These are in effect unregulated work days.
Four of these days have already been mandated for us and include, for example,
the Friday during the University’s Thanksgiving break. Now is this
or is this not a normal work day? Presumably it is because it is now a
designated mandatory furlough day which, under the existing guidelines, are
forbidden work days. Based on my experience as a college professor, this
arbitrary restriction deeply offends me. Our profession has always
expected us to work many days for which we are not explicitly paid, including
week-ends, holidays, and summer breaks. During this time we
voluntarily labor on scholarly enhancement, doing research, planning future
lectures, etc.. So, it is obvious that the so-called furlough days
will not actually reduce a faculty member’s workload because we have no real
choice but to do what we have been doing for our entire careers; namely, to
immerse ourselves in our profession without any attention to the number of hours
or days involved.
So, let’s abandon the charade of pretending that professors are hourly workers in the way that factory workers are. We have always been paid a salary for an aggregate calendar unit of months of scholarly work and if we want or need to work more than that, it has always been a matter of our own discretion to resolve. So let’s abandon this contrived invention of the furlough as something that has relevance and application to university faculty, because it doesn’t. We are professionals who work hard and long hours and who wish to continue doing so without a politically contrived impediment. Please just cut our pay by whatever percentage the State feels necessary and stop this insanity of imposing this furlough concept on us. It violates everything I have based my life around; namely, honesty, integrity, dedication, and the love of my profession.
Jac D. Bulk
2322 Winnebago Street
La Crosse, Wisconsin 54601
608-784-4757