Can I ask my adviser for a raise?

Question

Due to the recently passed tax bill by the United States Senate, graduate students will incur more taxes on their income which is already small. This will certainly affect my academic performance and research productivity. One of the professors in the department promised his students to compensate them by supplementary scholarships or awards. Can I ask my adviser to do the same thing to me?

How did he "promise" scholarships and awards to his students? — Mark, Dec 02 '17 at 17:16
@Mark he sent an email to his students, one of whom is my friend and informed me about it — The Hiary, Dec 02 '17 at 17:18
FYI, the grad student changes are in the House bill, not the Senate bill. So this will be decided during reconciliation. Also you will get a larger standard deduction. If you have health insurance through university you may be ahead. So much depends on reconciliation right now. So lobby! — Dawn, Dec 02 '17 at 18:56
"This will certainly affect my academic performance and research productivity." How? Is your effort a function of your pay? — chessofnerd, Dec 02 '17 at 21:01
@chessofnerd if you are getting paid less than you need for living then yes, this can definitely effect your productivity. — , Dec 02 '17 at 21:48
So your income is going to be taxed harder..., and you therefore want more income so that you have to pay even more tax..? I don't see the logic. — mathreadler, Dec 03 '17 at 01:34
@mathreadler: The OP wants more income so that they will have more money left over after taxes. — jwodder, Dec 03 '17 at 02:28
@jwodder but there may be other ways to do that which are not punished as harshly as with the new taxes would make. — mathreadler, Dec 03 '17 at 02:54
@chessofnerd I really can't imagine how could the payment and productivity be NOT related! I mean, seriously? — polfosol, Dec 03 '17 at 10:26
@mathreadler Given that you're a mathematician, if you don't see the logic here then I think you made the wrong career choice. Either that or you have an unbelievably deficient understanding of how taxes work... — J..., Dec 03 '17 at 13:57
@J... If I was a mathematician it would still not matter as this we are talking about is not mathematics but economics. If you get your income from somewhere else you may earn more than in the particular place where the taxes were increased. Say you could do another job that pays more relatively speaking but which is not punished by new taxes the same way. Then you would be better off doing that instead, at least if what you care about is the amount of money you get each month. — mathreadler, Dec 03 '17 at 14:19
@mathreadler Income from somewhere else is not an option. First you assert taxes paid is what matters and then what you take home matters. Are you a hot question spammer? — paparazzo, Dec 03 '17 at 15:44
@Paparazzi Income from somewhere else is not an option you say? But you are not the OP and the OP does not state that... The OP doesn't either state in the question what actually is important to him, which is why I consider both those options. You seem to get mad because I point out possibilities that you don't want people on here to even think about. Are you a hot question brainwasher? — mathreadler, Dec 03 '17 at 17:50
I thunk this question is based on a false premise. I believe they removed the tuition tax change before before the senate vote. — Matt, Dec 03 '17 at 21:20
I want to point out that the proposed tax change only affects you if getting your tuition waived by the university is a result of being employed as an RA/TA. If your tuition is waived for being a student, then it is a scholarship, and not taxable income. The solution? Departments pay your tuition for being a student and your stipend for being a TA/RA. — waldol1, Dec 04 '17 at 00:11

StrongBad · Accepted Answer · 2017-12-03T17:11:36.903

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First, it is not quite a law yet as it still needs to go through conference and be signed by the president. Regardless, you can ask for a raise, but arguing for a raise on the basis that your personal situation has changed is not really a good strategy. Most people ask for a raise when they can make a case that they have been performing well.

Many advisors do not have spare money floating around. Stipends can be set at the department or university level. As I said in this answer graduate student tution is an odd thing. Universities may either automatically increase stipends or decrease tution. It is really too soon to know. Your best bet is to probably unionize and make sure the university begins treating students responsibly.

The issue, at least as I see it, is that advisors need to justify to funders why a PhD student is needed as opposed to a permanent RA or post doc. When PhD students are cheaper than the other alternatives, it is easy. In my field, the NIH post doc rate is about $40,000 a year. This means there is only a little gap in costs between a PhD student, after covering tuition and fees, and a post doc.

The problem is not really the change in tax code, but rather in the fact that full time researchers are being charged tuition. This is something, at least in my opinion, that needs to be addressed on a university/department level and not with the individual advisor.

edited Dec 03 '17 at 17:11

answered Dec 02 '17 at 17:19

StrongBad

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OP isn't asking for a raise - they're asking to keep the same stipend and not to take a pay cut while remaining at the same level performance and responsibilities. One can argue whether this should be dealt with at the supervisor, department, or university level, but the first paragraph here simply isn't helpful. – E.P. Dec 02 '17 at 21:48
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Actually, not his personal situation has changed. The law has changed. He asks, whether this change may be compensated as done by other professors, as it seems. – Mayou36 Dec 02 '17 at 21:51
I am not familiar with the American academic system. Is there currently a student union, with any kind of power? And if not, then presumably it's the same as other countries where students simply have no bargaining power? – Sparhawk Dec 02 '17 at 21:55
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@E.P. No, he is literally asking for a raise. He says it in the question title, and the description of wanting more money for the same work is generally what is thought of as a "raise". The fact that it is merely to maintain the same net income after tax does not make it not a raise. – Matt Dec 02 '17 at 22:29
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@Matt You're certainly entitled to disregard any and all context. However, if your attitude towards student welfare is that something required to maintain the same net income is still a "raise", then I would warn any prospective graduate students to stay well away from taking you on as their adviser. – E.P. Dec 02 '17 at 23:10
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@E.P. Definitions of words do not change given the context. Its a raise no matter how it effects the OP's standard of living. For example, it is still called a raise if your employer increases your pay to track inflation. The word does not mean what you seem to want it to mean, and "student welfare" does not change that. – Matt Dec 02 '17 at 23:15
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@E.P. the law changed, but not everyone will have the same marginal tax rate on the tuition so it is not easy to calculate. Further, I can assure you that a faculty member asking for a raise since their taxes went up would be laughed at. – StrongBad Dec 03 '17 at 01:36
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@StrongBad I'm surprised you consider that comparison appropriate. As I'm sure you're aware, some of the potential tax increases would make graduate school entirely untenable for many people, with a disproportionate effect on students from less-privileged backgrounds. If a given supervisor's response to that change were to demand an exceptional performance increase from their students (as opposed to working with the students, the department, the university, and any relevant funders to find an appropriate solution) then my response would be an unambiguous "don't walk, run". – E.P. Dec 03 '17 at 01:56
@E.P. I have a responsibility to both my students and my funders. In order to go to my funder and justify a raise for the student, I need to be able to make a case why it is worth it to them. – StrongBad Dec 03 '17 at 02:07
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@StrongBad Indeed; a good starting point might be "this will enable the student to continue contributing to the research". The viewpoint you're presenting here sends a clear message along the lines of "this supervisor simply does not care about the student, or their welfare, beyond their usefulness to some pre-existing research programme", which I would take as an immediate prompt to start looking for a new supervisor. If you're OK with causing that impression, then I hope your research profile really is hot enough to offset the dent that that will make on your recruitment abilities. – E.P. Dec 03 '17 at 02:23
good answer, but in USA you dont have student UNIONS? – SSimon Dec 03 '17 at 08:21
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"arguing for a raise on the basis that your personal situation has changed is not really a good strategy" Well, saying something like "If I don't get a raise, I won't have enough money to live and will probably have to quit or take another job which will hurt my research. And BTW, no other students will want to replace me either." (if demonstrably true) in a salary negotiation does sound like a good bargaining strategy. – JiK Dec 03 '17 at 08:26
@JiK see edit. My funders would say, so have them drop out and become an RA. They are only willing to cover tuition and fees because a grad student is cheaper than a similarly qualified RA. – StrongBad Dec 03 '17 at 17:13

score 15 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 02 '17 at 21:14

Due to the recently passed tax bill by the senate, graduate students will incur more taxes on their income which is already small.

It is not law yet.

One of the professors in the department promised his students to compensate them by supplementary scholarships or awards.

They should not have done that. For something that affects literally every graduate student waiting for the university to figure out what they want to do before putting together some sort of patchwork solution is likely to be way more useful in the long term.

Can I ask my adviser to do the same thing to me?

You can certainly ask. But graduate student funding often comes from fixed pots of money, and lots of faculty don't just have piles of unallocated money sitting about. Further, many departments are aggressively opposed to having compensation in a department vary by advisor.

Beyond that, if you asked me, my answer would be "Lets wait and see what the university intends first."

score 7 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 02 '17 at 19:54

Such a request is likely to go nowhere. Most departments have a "fixed" stipend system: people get a pre-determined stipend, although this can be augmented when needed. Usually, such "raises" are to "reward" students for bringing in outside money, or for moving from the master's phase of a program to the doctoral phase.

The better approach would be to organize with students across the university to see what can be done (perhaps lowering the amount of the tuition charge associated with the waiver?).

score 2 · Answer 4 · answered Dec 03 '17 at 18:20

The people who run universities in the United States are acutely aware of this legislation, even though it isn't in final form yet. There will be a reconciliation process, in which the House and Senate bills are merged. (Kind of like making sausage!) When that happens, possibly in the next couple of weeks, you and everyone else will know what will happen to grad students' taxes. The bill still has to be signed into law by the President, and that seems very likely to happen.

Then it will be appropriate to ask what your university will do for all graduate students in your situation. Be aware that it may take some time for them to figure it out, but they probably can't leave grad students in a position of no or negative income.

Can I ask my adviser for a raise?

4 Answers4