On May 1st, 500 Rutgers employees joined an Open the Books event and heard Professor of Accounting and AAUP national leader Howard Bunsis detail Rutgers’ finances. Please take some time to review the video presentation and/or the powerpoint presentation and share it with your colleagues.
Here are some of the highlights of Prof. Bunsis’s presentation. You can find his powerpoint slides here.
1. Strong Financials: Rutgers has an Aa3 bond rating per Moody’s. This is the fourth highest rating out of 24 potential rating categories, so Rutgers is one of the most financially healthy public universities.
2. Unrestricted Reserves: In 2019, Rutgers held $583.1 million in unrestricted reserves, that is, funds accumulated from the budget surpluses of previous years (including $74 million from 2018–19) and saved for unexpected expenses and special projects. We have asked Rutgers to commit to spending at least half of the reserves to protect our community in these difficult times.
3. Restricted Reserves: Rutgers has $622.1 million in restricted reserves. In all, it has $1.2 billion in reserves.
4. Management Bloat: There are 312 upper level managers who earn an average salary of $209,000. The ranks of management continue to grow every year as do their raises, which far exceed those of other employees.
5. Athletics Subsidies: Rutgers subsidizes its athletics program at a rate far higher than any other Big Ten university. While the RCM model has led to budget cuts in the library, there are always funds to subsidize athletics.