UWP Lecturers interview with Mark Yudof

[Gray Scott]

Hello all,

With regard to the apparent disagreement about Yudof's "salary," there are some games being played on both sides of that conversation. 

Interviewer: "$828,000 in annual compensation"
Yudof: "My salary is $540,000" (after cutting it $60,000)

Yudof is right about his salary, but that's not the same thing as annual compensation. (As an aside, $540,000 plus $120,000 for housing is $660,000 -- still not anywhere near $828,000.) 

At the same time, the interviewer and Wikipedia both falsely suggest his "annual compensation" is $828,000. It isn't. They're basing that figure on an amount reported in the Daily Californian, which does indeed list his first year compensation package at $828,000, but $228,000 of that total is a first-year contribution to his pension -- it doesn't repeat. 

(Yes, I know, Wikipedia is <gasp> wrong. Maybe I'll go back later and correct it. That gets exhausting after a while, though.)

At any rate, when he says his compensation has been exaggerated, that's doubtless what he's talking about. 

As a rhetoric nut, I have to say I got a kick out of his ability in one answer to limit discussion of his compensation just to salary -- but several questions later, when the interviewer tries to do the same thing with the compensation for the President of the United States (asserting his pay is only $400,000), he calls her on it, throwing in the President's plane and housing. That's pretty smooth. Gutsy, too. 

- Gray


  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: ctuell at ucr.edu 
  To: Kathleen Gurnett ; englecturers at lists.ucr.edu 
  Sent: Saturday, September 26, 2009 7:55 AM
  Subject: Re: UWP Lecturers interview with Mark Yudof


  Kathleen,
  I asked myself the same questions about how this interview had 
  been edited. Did the interviewer want Yudof to look like a 
  clownish character out of a Beckett play? Did Yudof want to 
  appear so? He does say he likes a joke.

  By the way, if you add the $10K a month to what he says his 
  salary is it comes up to over $800K. I do think housing 
  allowances should be officially part of salary. 

  Cynthia

  Cynthia Tuell
  Lecturer, University Writing Program
  UC Riverside
  951-827-1949
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  Englecturers at lists.ucr.edu
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