Report examines lecturer-prof pay gap at UM

Is the vast difference between what lecturers are paid and professors are paid for teaching the same courses justified by a similar difference in the quality of teaching?  If not, why does the pay gap exist? What can and should be done to close it? 

These are among the questions probed in a new report entitled Teaching Equality: What the Principle of Equal Pay for Equal Work Means for Lecturer Pay at the University of Michigan. 

 The report, authored by Ian Robinson of the UM Department of Sociology and the Residential College, demonstrates that the "current gap in pay for the teaching component of faculty work is very large" and argues that the gap represents a violation of the principle of equal pay for equal work. The report calls for a new, equitable model of faculty compensation for teaching that would enhance the educational mission of the university without requiring an increase in student tuition.