UK Vice Chancellor compensation: Do they get what they deserve?

Abstract

The compensation received by UK Vice Chancellors (VCs) has been on an upward trend in recent years and attracted a lot of negative media attention. In this paper, we examine whether VCs receive the compensation they deserve. Using a panel dataset covering the academic years 2007/2008 to 2018/2019, we develop a model to predict expected VC compensation to determine whether VCs are over- or undercompensated. Our model finds that VCs are not overcompensated regarding their base salary, but some are overcompensated in terms of their benefits and pension contributions. However, there is very little difference in terms of characteristics of over- and undercompensated VCs, indicating that on average, UK VCs receive the compensation they deserve. For robustness purposes, we employ a variety of alternative model specifications and subsamples which all support our previous findings.