ARL: Library Salaries Grow

Still, rate of increase for those in first jobs has dipped

By Andrew Albanese -- Library Journal, 9/1/2005

The growth in librarian salaries outpaced inflation once again in 2004–05, according to the recent Association of Research Libraries (ARL) Annual Salary Survey. Overall, the survey found that the median salary for U.S. and Canadian ARL university members rose to $55,250, up a healthy 4.2 percent, higher than the combined 2003–04 rate of increase (2.6 percent) and comfortably ahead of the U.S. Consumer Price Index (three percent) as well as inflation in Canada (2.3 percent).

The survey was drawn from a total of 9,487 professional staff positions from the 113 ARL university libraries, including law and medical facilities, and 3,946 staff members for ARL's ten nonuniversity libraries. Of those positions, 8,581 are in U.S. institutions and 906 are in Canadian institutions.

But it's not quite a comeback. Despite the overall increase, the rate of increase for beginning salaries dipped slightly, to 2.73 percent. According to Mark Young, ARL research assistant for statistics and measurement, the median beginning salary increases, which showed some "sharp jumps in the late 1990s and early 2000s," increased by $984 in 2004–05, to $36,984. Beginning salaries had increased by more than $1000 in each of the previous two surveys.

Also notable: the gap between salaries at private university libraries and at public university libraries narrowed for the first time in several years, to 5.9 percent.