USC is in a financial crisis. Why are staff and faculty shouldering the burden?

This is a guest column. All three authors are tenured professors at USC.

Five months ago, USC announced something that a series of sweeping budget cuts had already signaled: It was facing a structural deficit of $158 million, and more pain would be coming. As Provost Andrew Guzman then told the faculty senate, “Difficult decisions are going to have to be made.”

Matters have since gotten worse. USC now faces cuts to federal research funding and potential decreases in international student enrollment due to the Trump administration’s policies. Leadership has responded to this perfect storm of budget pressure by freezing faculty and staff wages, halting hiring, and suspending many investments in student learning, including the purchase of certain library books and all new database and journal subscriptions. 

It will undoubtedly take shared sacrifice to weather the next four years of this administration. But at USC, it seems that sacrifice is coming from the bottom up. 

This year, with a few limited exceptions, no USC employees will receive a merit raise. The so-called austerity measure was introduced alongside notable cuts to employee benefits and increases in out-of-pocket healthcare costs. Meanwhile, USC’s administrators, many of whom earn seven-figure salaries, have not committed to eschewing their own contractually-defined pay raises.

IRS data shows that in the 2022-2023 academic year (the most recent year available), 18 USC executives made over $1 million. This includes $3 million paid to former President Max Nikias, along with the over $3.5 million base salary paid to our current president — not including housing and other perks.

We propose that the university’s top earners commit to freezing their wages and taking pay cuts. This will ensure that USC does not balance its budget on the backs of our most vulnerable staff and faculty.

There is precedent for this. In 2020, at the onset of the pandemic, the president took a 20% reduction in salary, and the provost, senior vice presidents, and deans reduced their salaries by 10%, while reinstating pay increases for employees making less than $100,000 per year.

But in 2025, when presented with this idea at faculty senate meetings and via email, the administration has variously dodged the question, admitted that there has been no discussion about the option, or stated that they’ve already detailed their plans to address “financial resiliency.”

“As things continue to evolve at the federal and local level, we will regularly assess how we are progressing and whether further actions or adjustments are needed,” a university spokesperson wrote when asked for comment on this column.

USC’s plan to equally cut salaries and benefits across the university — excluding unionized and contractually obligated employees — is regressive by its very nature, and will fall much harder on lower-paid workers.

University administrators are responsible for shouldering this burden, not just because they are paid more than anybody else, but because they are charged with stewardship of the school and its financial health.

We are told that administrators’ salaries are justified because of their responsibilities. But by that logic, if the institution is on the financial rocks — which we know was the case even before the election — that is on some level their doing: their failure to plan or anticipate.

Cuts for the rest of us in this context are especially unacceptable. If USC’s executive ranks are truly committed to our community, they will take the same pay cuts they took during the COVID-19 crisis. 

Howard A. Rodman, Professor, School of Cinematic Arts
Christina Dunbar-Hester, Professor, Annenberg School for Communication
Laura Isabel Serna, Associate Professor, Dornsife College and School of Cinematic Arts

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