Increased use of merit pay is attributed to growing competition among institutions to attract and retain faculty, demands for accountability of faculty, and a reflection of a trend in private industry toward providing more financial incentives for employees. (MLW)

A national survey has found little change in faculty salary differentials among disciplines. For the second year, however, public institutions' salary growth outpaced private institutions'. Other trends include "compression" of salaries among faculty ranks within a field and higher salaries for faculty with union contracts. (MSE)

An annual survey of college faculty pay shows faculty in "hard-to-hire" disciplines such as engineering, accounting, physics, and computer science continue to command higher-than-average salaries, while disciplines recently at the bottom of the pay scale remain there. At all ranks except full professor, private college faculty earned more. (MSE)

New assistant or associate professors command more money than current professors with seniority or higher rank. This faculty-pay dilemma is known as "salary compression." Salary compression occurs when colleges are pressured by the job market to pay competitive salaries to attract scholars at lower ranks. (MLW)