By the numbers
The average annual wages paid to professors at University of Wisconsin campuses have generally risen, but the rate at which they’ve risen varies widely — as do the campus averages.
The underlying numbers
These are averages by campus and by year for people with the title “professor,” excluding those with other titles, such as “associate professor” or “assistant professor.”
| 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | Change since 2017 | |
| UW-Madison | 157,508 | 161,538 | 172,594 | 181,230 | 188,837 | 192,373 | 18.1% |
| UW-Milwaukee | 122,060 | 121,016 | 128,101 | 127,102 | 129,148 | 129,274 | 5.6% |
| UW-Parkside | 86,226 | 83,979 | 87,990 | 85,698 | 98,455 | 106,168 | 18.8% |
| UW-Eau Claire | 86,024 | 89,080 | 91,874 | 91,917 | 94,121 | 99,581 | 13.6% |
| UW-Green Bay | 83,626 | 79,782 | 82,143 | 85,325 | 91,996 | 97,842 | 14.5% |
| UW-Oshkosh | 92,008 | 91,917 | 92,909 | 89,455 | 93,661 | 96,504 | 4.6% |
| UW-Whitewater | 93,452 | 92,029 | 92,245 | 94,299 | 92,567 | 96,404 | 3.1% |
| UW-La Crosse | 92,981 | 92,972 | 93,956 | 95,413 | 95,745 | 95,383 | 2.5% |
| UW-River Falls | 83,972 | 84,415 | 89,548 | 89,558 | 91,520 | 93,599 | 10.3% |
| UW-Stout | 82,029 | 85,834 | 90,110 | 89,044 | 87,672 | 86,172 | 4.8% |
| UW-Stevens Point | 80,289 | 80,390 | 82,229 | 83,608 | 84,911 | 86,055 | 6.7% |
| UW-Platteville | 83,362 | 85,040 | 85,657 | 85,162 | 87,878 | 85,938 | 3.0% |
| UW-Superior | 75,821 | 80,489 | 76,843 | 78,811 | 80,442 | 75,294 | -0.7% |
| Avg: Other comprehensives | 86,425 | 86,829 | 89,185 | 89,309 | 91,116 | 93,053 | 7.1% |
Graphed, the figures look like this:
UW-Madison and UW-Milwaukee differ from other universities in the system in that they are what UW refers to as Research I schools, with graduate programs awarding doctoral degrees. UW refers to the other 11 universities as “comprehensive” universities.
UW-Parkside and UW-Superior are singled out as they have the highest and lowest average professor salaries among the comprehensive universities. The other universities not singled out here but represented by unlabeled red lines are Eau Claire, Green Bay, La Crosse, Oshkosh, Platteville, River Falls, Stevens Point, Stout, and Whitewater.
We got the data from Open the Books, an Illinois nonprofit government transparency group that offers an online search tool showing public employees’ pay. We downloaded individual “annual wages” figures for individuals and averaged them by campus.
Published in the Nov. 3 issue of Top Picks.
