Right now, the team responsible for Brown investments and endowment security is gloriously exhaling a sigh of sweet relief. In the calm after the economic storm, Brown's endowment returns were 10 percent in the fiscal year 2010, and Alice Tisch, our esteemed chancellor's wife, can finally stop living like a plebeian, having been forced for the past year to cut her daily lunch budget to a pittance of $30–40 per day. At least for the wealthy corporations and individuals of the world, the worst of the economic storm has passed. By the grace of what can surely be attributed only to a divine power, we can safely resume hoarding enormous sums of money.
It would seem that in the wake of this lifted burden, the entire community should be able to join Alice Tisch in celebration. However, the administration has taken a rather puzzling path with respect to our increased financial stability. Balancing the budget on the backs of Dining Services and other University workers was objectionable and fairly useless even in the climax of the financial crisis, but the nature of the current contract negotiations between Brown and the library workers is downright nonsensical given our recent monetary rebound.
The first and possibly most egregious term of the new contract being offered by the University is an increase in health care premium co-pays from 6 percent to 15 percent over a three-year period. With the full family plan premium currently costing $1,304.19 per month, a simple calculation shows that in practical terms, the percentages boil down to an increased co-pay of $117.37. Although euphemized and disguised as an increase in the worker's health care co-pay, in practical terms this simply boils down to a wage decrease.
Secondly, Brown is trying either to eliminate or to change an important clause in the library workers' contract. Briefly, the library workers currently have the right to be notified of permanent shift changes months in advance, and if they don't like their new hours, they can strike. Brown is trying either a) to completely eliminate this clause, or b) to water it down such that the workers will have less control over their shift changes and will no longer have the right to subsequently protest.
In these contract negotiations, the University keeps telling the library workers that they need to "take their share" of the loss in the aftermath of a huge economic crash, thus framing the proposed conditions as fair and necessary. This is a demonstrably false narrative, not only because our endowment is once again on the rise, but also because of scale. There are about 60 workers who will be affected by this contract change, meaning that if each of them pays an extra $117.37 per month, the increased revenue for the University will amount to $84,506.40. Since the operating budget of the University for the 2011 fiscal year is $786.6 million, these cuts would represent a .01 percent increase in our available capital. Taking the highest possible salary a Brown library worker could make, $52,648, the rise in health care premium co-pay would cost such a worker roughly 2.67 percent of his or her yearly income. Thus, Brown is asking the library workers to make a contribution, on average, 267 times larger for them than its respective value to the University.
The implications of this follow pretty easily; even if these proposed changes will come at great cost to a number of Brown community members and at little to no value to the University itself, they will be pursued just the same. The reappropriation of money from a single Building Brown project to our budget would account for every staff cut and contested contract in the last two years, the current one and many to come.
The priorities of our University are thus brought into stark relief: buildings trump people, prestige trumps community and the wellbeing of workers is cast to the gutter by administrators who face little consequence and community accountability.
As I am a strong believer in praxis, anyone who agrees with this analysis should stand beside the library workers as they fight for the benefits that can make or break a family's well-being in these tough times. The Student Labor Alliance has been campaigning strongly against these proposed contract changes and has requested that members of the Brown community send e-mails to the Director of Labor and Employee Relations Joe Sarno, sign a petition and make calls to the administration demanding that these ridiculous proposals be rebuked. As a strong community should, let's close rank around the library workers and let the administration know that we will not stand for this callous devaluation of workers' rights.
Chris Norris-LeBlanc '13 is from Rhode Island. He can be contacted at chris.norris.leblanc (at) gmail (dot) com.
