DOES TENURE PROTECT THE SALARIES OF MEDICAL-SCHOOL FACULTY

When faculty have tenure, are their salaries protected! If so, what po rtion and in what circumstances! In the era of managed care and shrink ing resources, these questions are becoming particularly important at medical schools because salaries there tend to be higher than salaries elsewhere in academia and because those salaries are more commonly de pendent on outside funding. A fundamental question that will increasin gly be asked is whether reductions in the salaries of tenured faculty are legally permissible. To a large extent, the answer is a matter of interpreting what each medical school has contractually obligated itse lf to do regarding tenure; generally, schools' tenure rules support th e legal right to impose a salary reduction. But, in fact, the historic al record shows few instances of such reductions. Thus there are few j udicial decisions regarding tenure that can help predict how particula r tenure contracts are likely to be interpreted. In this situation, fa culty and institutions can be expected to interpret the historical abs ence of salary reductions for tenured faculty in contrasting ways, Gen erally, if the written policies are clear, past practices will Flay li ttle or no legal role. If the policies are unclear, institutions must show that their practices were primarily related to the pre 1994 condi tions of mandatory retirement and have little relevance to present cir cumstances. Although the main historical purpose of tenure was the pro tection of academic freedom, can the protection of salary be encompass ed within this purpose? Usually not; the current situation is almost a lways one in which cost concerns, not political ones, motivate medical schools to reduce the salaries of faculty with reduced funding or pra ctice incomes, The author concludes that although there are few preced ents and many unexplored issues, it is clear that tenure was not inten ded to protect full salaries at most medical schools. His view is that in appropriate circum stances, reductions in the salaries of tenured faculty are legally achievable.