11 Insanely Overpaid Public Employees
Earnings: $7.1 million a year
Where: University of Alabama
In addition to his whopping $7.1 million total earnings in 2014, the head coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide football team, Nick Saban, is living in a multimillion-dollar mansion paid for by the school. Touchdown!
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Earnings: $5.75 million a year
Where: University of Louisville
Rick Pitino, the coach of the University of Louisville’s basketball team, not only has a salary higher than the university president’s piddling $1.2 million, but his total pay is also more than the gross profit of the school’s basketball program, which stands at $4.6 million. At 62, he’s the second-highest-paid NCAA Division I men’s basketball coach.
© USA Today Sports / Reuters
Earnings: $1.9 million a year
Where: Citizens Energy Group, Indiana
Carey Lykins’s 2014 multimillion-dollar pay package at the Indiana utility company was too good to last. After heavy criticism, his pay will get cut by almost one third under a new executive compensation system. He’s also slated to retire at the end of June. The comp of several other Citizens’ executives is up there, too. William Tracy, senior vice president and chief operations officer, made $981,037 in 2014.
IndyStar
Earnings: $1.3 million a year
Where: University of Nevada, Reno
You most likely have never heard of William Zamboni and his astonishing salary. Zamboni is a professor and chairman of the department of surgery, as well as the chief of the division of plastic surgery, at the University of Nevada School of Medicine. As the state’s highest-paid state employee, earned $1.3 million in base pay and benefits in 2014, according to TransparentNevada.com.
Nevada.edu
Earnings: $1.27 million a year
Where: University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston, Texas
Walter Lowe, a professor who specializes in sports medicine and who has been the chair of orthopedic surgery at The University of Texas Health and Science Center at Houston since 2009, isn’t your average doctor. As the team physician to both the NBA Houston Rockets and NFL Houston Texans, he’s operated on athletes such as Dwight Howard. His total compensation from the University of Texas was $1.27 million for 2014.
Walter R Lowe
Earnings: $1.18 million a year
Where: BETA Healthcare Group Risk Management Authority, California
BETA was created in the 1970s by 17 California district hospitals to provide affordable medical malpractice insurance to healthcare workers. Its CEO, Tom Wander, earned more than $1 million in total compensation in 2012, making him one of the best-paid public employee in the Golden State. Because BETA is organized as a special district, a narrowly-focused government agency in California, its public servants need to be highly specialized, have advanced degrees and know local regulations, and as a result tend to have higher salary rates than other public employees, according to the OC Register.
Earnings: $786,596 a year
Where: Virginia Retirement System
The VRS’s chief investment officer, Ronald Schmitz was the highest-paid employee in the state in 2013, thanks in part to a hefty bonus, according to a list compiled last year by the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Such a salary is roughly two to three times that of a CIO in California or New York despite the fact that VRS’s fund size is more than four times smaller than in those other states.
PiOnline/David Stover
Earnings: $600,000 a year
Where: University of Maryland
When Robert Caret, former University of Massachusetts president, accepted a new job as chancellor of the University System of Maryland, not only did he jump at the opportunity to return to his home state but he also accepted a $100,000 raise over his UMass’s yearly salary. The position is effective as of July 1, 2015.
Flickr/Umass Amherst
Earnings: $445,000
Where: New York City Board of Correction, New York
Technically called a correctional standards review specialist, a jail grievance coordinator typically deals with inmates’ complaints about missing or stolen property or visitation rights being denied. In 2014, it was one of the highest-earning positions in New York City, surpassing Mayor Bill de Blasio’s yearly salary of $225,000.
iStockphoto
Earnings: $401,589 a year
Where: VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System, Pennsylvania
Veterans Administration doctors were some of the highest-paid federal employees in 2014. Thomas Cacciarelli, a surgeon at the VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System in Pennsylvania, made $401,589 in 2014, while Thomas Burdon, a thoracic surgeon with the VA Palo Alto Health Care System in California made $402,462, more than President Barack Obama’s salary of $400,000, which doesn’t include benefits. Such high salaries can come as a shock when VA hospitals all over the country have been under scrutiny for delayed veteran care.
Wikimedia Commons
Earnings: $238,394 a year
Where: Bayonne, Hudson County, New Jersey
In New Jersey, police chiefs with the highest salaries aren’t always the ones overseeing the largest police forces or dealing with the highest crime rates. The police chief with the highest pay is Drew Niekrasz, who oversees 155 officers in Bayonne. He makes $33,214 more than New York City Police Commissioner Bill Bratton, who oversees more than 34,000 officers across the river. Even Governor Chris Christie makes $63,394 less than Niekrasz.
nj.com