The University Insider is The Daily’s first faculty and staff-oriented newsletter. This weekly newsletter will give U-M faculty and staff the ability to see the most important issues on campus and in Ann Arbor — particularly those related to administrative decisions — from the perspective of an independent news organization. It will also provide a better understanding of student perspectives.
The Michigan Daily News section will continue to fact check and research claims made by both GEO and the University and will update this article as needed.
Last Update: 4/11
After months of contract negotiations between the University of Michigan and the Graduate Employees’ Organization, members of GEO commenced a strike against the University on March 29. The strike intensified the conflict between the University and GEO in their bargaining process.
Disputes over the definition of a living wage continued to cause rifts in bargaining sessions, even as both sides point to the same metric for calculating living wage: the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s living wage calculator. Additionally, GEO and the University disagree about the scope of GEO’s bargaining power and what falls under their area of concern as a labor union.
The Michigan Daily has fact-checked claims made by both the University and GEO to clarify the demands made in their contract negotiations.
After months of contract negotiations between the University of Michigan and the Graduate Employees Organization, members of GEO commenced a strike against the University on March 29. The strike intensified the conflict between the University and GEO on the bargaining process and its contents.
Disputes over the definition of a living wage continue to cause rifts in bargaining sessions, even as both sides point to the same metric of calculating living wage: the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s living wage calculator. Additionally, contradicting perspectives emerged surrounding the scope of GEO’s bargaining power and what falls under their area of concern as a labor union.
The Michigan Daily has fact checked claims made by both the University and GEO to clear up the truth about their contract negotiations.
Living Wage Definitions and Claims
Both GEO and the University have referred to MIT’s living wage calculator as a means of determining an appropriate wage for graduate students employed by the University. According to MIT, the calculator provides an estimation for the cost of living in a particular geographic area based on average expenses.
GEO: According to the demands outlined in GEO’s platform, a living wage for graduate student workers would be $38,537. Meeting this demand would constitute a raise of approximately 60% to the current salary for Graduate Student Instructors and Graduate Student Staff Assistants, which is $24,055. According to GEO, a raise of this significance would bring relief to many rent-burdened graduate student workers. In their platform, GEO claims that 64% of the organization’s members work more than the number of hours indicated by their contract at least once and 60% worked more than 21 hours per week in their GSI or GSSA position at least once during the semester.
University: In an email to The Michigan Daily, University spokeswoman Kim Broekhuizen wrote that the University’s latest compensation counter proposal of a 11.5% raise places hourly pay for graduate student workers at two times that of the rate indicated by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s living wage calculator.
“The University’s current compensation proposal includes raises in Ann Arbor of 11.5% total over three years, which is the highest salary increase in the last 15 years,” Broekhuizen wrote. “It also puts hourly pay at more than double the hourly rate indicated on the MIT Living Wage calculator, a measure frequently cited by GEO.”
Fact Check: The University’s and GEO’s living wage calculations are both partially correct in how they describe the current and proposed wages. The University pays graduate student employees a set salary based on the number of hours they are contracted to work. Though it may vary by department, the University currently pays GSIs a salary of about $24,000 a year for working 20 hours a week during the winter and fall semesters. That means they get paid the equivalent of an hourly wage of about $35.
According to MIT’s living wage calculator, an hourly living wage for 1 adult without children in Ann Arbor is $18.67. As agreed upon by both GEO and the University in GEO’s current contract, hourly wages for graduate employees are calculated in the following manner:
“Section J. Calculation of Per-Hour Rate The per-hour rate shall be calculated as follows: 1. Multiply the contractual minimum full-time equivalent salary rate for the term in which the substitution takes place by three. 2. Divide that product by 2,080 hours. 3. The result is the per-hour rate.”
While that sets the hourly wage that graduate student employees currently receive above MIT’s living wage for Ann Arbor, GEO is correct that graduate students do not generally receive the annual salary that the MIT living wage calculator suggests for Ann Arbor. The calculator says Ann Arbor residents should make a total of $38,537 annually to achieve a minimum standard of life based on the local cost of living.
In order to meet a salary of $38,537, GSIs and GSSAs would need to either be contracted for more than 20 hours per week or paid more. However, departments place limits on the number of hours per week that GSIs are contracted for. For instance, the School of Information typically appoints GSIs and GSSAs to work 20 hours per week. To work more than 30 hours per week, graduate student employees need permission from their advisor.
The University’s current proposal for a raise of 11.5% over the next 3 years would bring salaries to $26,821 for graduate student employees who work 20 hours a week. Following the hourly rate calculations outlined in the contract, the per-hour rate for this salary would be $38.68, which is more than 2 times the living wage calculated by MIT. Though most GSIs are appointed to work 16-20 hours per week, many international graduate students hold visas that explicitly prohibit them from working more than 20 hours per week, limiting their ability to accumulate a salary on par with that delineated by the living wage calculator. The 20 hours limitation means even if international graduate students work more than this amount, they are unable to report their extra work because it violates their visa. This can present continued barriers to affording the cost of living in Ann Arbor.
Money
GEO: In their platform, GEO says a $14,800 raise for all GSIs and GSSAs would cost the University about $30 million and would be a “drop in the bucket” in terms of the University’s expenses.
University: As of the 2022 fiscal year, the University had an endowment of $17.3 billion. The University spent $1.7 billion of its general fund on schools within the University.
Fact Check: According to the University’s 2022-2023 budget, the Ann Arbor campus was forecasted to have revenues in excess of expenditures of $91,886,191. The University has an endowment of $17.3 billion. There are two types of endowment funds, true endowment and quasi-endowment funds. The University can only spend the true endowment funds as specified by the donors, but the University can spend quasi-endowment funds on long-term programs or projects deemed critical by the University. The quasi-endowment is partially made up of unrestricted funds meant for long term investment by the University. It is unclear whether unrestricted quasi-endowment money could be used to fund increased GSI and GSSA salaries.
According to an audit by Howard Bunsis, an accounting professor at Eastern Michigan University, it is estimated that the University of Michigan earns about $200 million in surplus tuition and fees when compared against graduate workers’ income. Bunsis said in the audit though it is unclear exactly how much money graduate workers’ research generates for the University, graduate workers do help generate a portion of the $1.4 billion. The University’s 2023-2024 budget has not been presented or approved by the Board of Regents yet, but will be approved at one of their 2023 summer meetings.
GEO Bargaining Power Scope
In their platform, and in ongoing contract negotiations, members of GEO’s bargaining unit have made demands of the University that GEO claims will benefit the entirety of the University and local Ann Arbor communities. The University claims these demands cannot be discussed without input from other groups.
GEO: Members of GEO who are advocating for demands such as expanded transgender health care coverage and non-police emergency response force have said they are fighting to improve conditions for the entire University community. According to GEO’s platform, the University should help pay for Washtenaw County’s planned community-led, non-police unarmed emergency response program because it would benefit the entire U-M community.
In an interview with The Michigan Daily, Michael Mueller, who serves on GEO’s organizing committee, emphasized the role GEO can play in moving the University forward, while also fighting for changes to their own labor conditions. Mueller said advancing the University’s coverage of health care and child care services, for example, would help make the University more inclusive.
“A lot of the demands will improve conditions for not just graduate students, but for (undergraduate) students (through) class size caps, for instance, and trans health demands would improve the experience of trans folks throughout the community,” Mueller said. “This is really about advancing a vision of a better university, not just for grad students, but for all of us.”
University: In a joint email sent out to the U-M community on March 24 from University President Santa Ono and University Provost Laurie McCauley, the administration claimed some of GEO’s demands were outside the scope of their bargaining power as a labor union. Ono and McCauley said any change that affects the whole U-M community should be considered by the broader campus community, not just members of GEO.
“GEO’s threat to strike is based on a number of issues, some of which are not related to GSIs’ and GSSAs’ wages, hours, and working conditions,” the email said. “Some of these issues are important for our campus and merit further discussion with diverse perspectives and other community groups.”
Fact Check: In an interview with The Daily, Joseph Slater, U-M Law School alum and University of Toledo law professor, said Michigan’s collective bargaining laws create a balance between a union’s bargaining rights and the rights of management. Slater said though he is not an expert on what is happening between U-M administration and GEO, it appears that many of the GEO bargaining demands are not directly related to pay, working hours and conditions, meaning those demands are in a gray area between union and employer rights.
“Michigan’s law is much like other state laws where there’s a fairly broad balancing test approach where, in general, workers can bargain about their things that affect their wages, hours and working conditions, while at the same time there are certain types of issues that are reserved to management as management rights,” Slater said. “There are things that kind of overlap in both categories, and those are close cases.”
According to Slater, there are three categories of collective bargaining topics: mandatory, illegal and permissive. Permissive bargaining topics are only discussed if both sides agree to bargain on the subject. Slater said though GEO’s demands of an addition of an unarmed community response team is very likely a permissive bargaining subject, he could see the argument for it relating to worker safety and therefore being a mandatory bargaining subject.
“I would say it’s probably a good guess that restructuring (Division of Public Safety and Security) would likely be a permissive topic,” Slater said. “Now, the argument that it would be a mandatory topic is that typically worker safety issues are typically mandatory topics but restructuring the organization of an agency within the employer is typically a management right. Without offering a legal opinion, it’s likely that that is permissive in the sense that the employer could agree to (bargain about restructuring) if it wanted to. But (the University) doesn’t have to bargain about (DPSS).”
The Strike
GEO has been on strike since March 29. The University filed for an emergency injunction in Washtenaw County Circuit Court March 31 to end the strike on the grounds that they believe it was in violation of GEO’s contract and Michigan law and was causing irreparable harm to the University community. GEO claims the strike was a forced course of action based on the University’s unwillingness to bargain in good faith.
GEO: According to members of GEO, the University is responsible for the ongoing strike. From their perspective, the University has not bargained in good faith or made any significant or serious changes to their counter-proposals.
University: According to the University, the current strike violates GEO’s current contract with the University, as well as Michigan law. The University has also claimed the strike has caused irreparable harm to the University.
Fact Check: It remains unclear whether or not the University has bargained in good faith. According to the Washtenaw County Circuit Court’s rejection of the emergency injunction, the University has not suffered irreparable harm because of the strike.
In GEO’s current contract, GEO and the University both agreed to comply fully with the Public Employment Relations Act, which prohibits both strikes and lockouts. The strike is illegal under Michigan law.
“A public employee shall not strike and a public school employer shall not institute a lockout,” the act said. “A public school employer does not violate this section if there is a total or partial cessation of the public school employer’s operations in response to a strike held in violation of this section.”
The strike also violates GEO’s current contract, specifically outlined in Article III.
“The Union, through its officials, will not cause, instigate, support or encourage, nor shall any Employee take part in, any concerted action against or any concerted interference with the operations of the University, such as the failure to report for duty, the absence from one’s position, the stoppage of work, or the failure, in whole or part, to fully, faithfully, and properly perform the duties of employment,” the contract said.
The Washtenaw County Circuit Court held an evidentiary hearing April 10 where a judge determined the University has not suffered irreparable harm from the strike. The court did not grant the injection so the GEO strike will continue.
Correction: This article has been updated to reflect that GEO has bargained for an unarmed community response team during their negotiations.
Daily Staff Reporter Bronwyn Johnston can be reached at jbronwyn@umich.edu. Daily Staff Reporter Miles Anderson can be reached at milesand@umich.edu.