Is your paycheck recession-proof?
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B.R. pay is below average, but we’re better off than most
LSU football coach Les Miles makes nearly $4 million per year. For that matter, he was paid more for going 8-5 in 2008 than he was when the Tigers won the national championship the year before.
Some Louisiana CEOs
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J.M. Bernhard Jr., Shaw Group—$9,410,355
Glen F. Post III, CenturyTel—$8,973,760
J. Wayne Leonard, Entergy Corp.—$8,500,000
Mark C. Rohr, Albemarle—$6,289,310
Dean E. Taylor, Tidewater—$5,237,480
Terence Hall, Superior Energy—$4,859,653
Kevin P. Reilly Jr. , Lamar Advertising—$4,699,426
William F. “Bill” Borne, Amedisys—$2,267,388
Michael H. Madison, Cleco Corp.—$1,775,864
John M. Engquist, H&H Equipment Services—$1,368,832
Manuel Perez, Pool Corp.—$1,327,518
Sources: forbes.com, businessweek.com
That was probably not the case with the person who took your most recent fast-food order. Minimum wage in America is $6.55 per hour. Putting that in grandiose perspective, it would take a minimum wage employee more than 69 years of continuous 24/7 work to reach the Les Miles mark.
Most of us make something in between, and—interestingly—most Baton Rougeans are OK with that.
Other cities are much worse off than Baton Rouge, which was one of the top-growing metro areas in the country in 2008. But recent layoffs at Dow Chemical, Albemarle and some construction companies have brought the economic crisis home.
All in all, are Baton Rouge jobs and their salaries safe?
For now—perhaps.
Baton Rouge Area Chamber CEO Adam Knapp says, “Something unique is happening here that folks should be paying attention to.”
A 225 survey supports that. While not everyone makes what they think they should—44% said they felt their compensation to be inadequate—our survey, conducted on the Internet and allowing for anonymity from 550 respondents, suggests Baton Rougeans think they’re doing pretty well.
Respondents for the most part were pleased with what they earn: 56% said they felt their compensation to be at least fair.
There are, of course, inequities in earnings, and our survey revealed some of those.
While the numbers of men and women who said their salaries have risen in the past year were similar, women were much more likely to feel their pay is in adequate for the work they do.
Les Miles, LSU football coach—$3,500,000
Mike Martin, LSU Chancellor—$400,000 (plus $125,000 in deferred pay if he stays for 5 years)
Paul Pastorek, State schools superintendent—$341,170
Kofi Lomoety, Southern University Chancellor—$295,000
Angele Davis, Commissioner of Administration—$204,401
Bobby Jindal, Governor—$130,000
Kip Holden, Baton Rouge Mayor—$120,343
Sources: State of Louisiana, City-Parish, Baton Rouge Business Report
People earning $21,000 to $40,000 were most likely to report feeling they were inadequately paid, followed closely by those making $41,000 to $60,000.
Overall, 58% of people making more than $41,000 reported feeling satisfied or prosperous, but once again, more males (200) felt that good about their pay than women (169).
And interestingly, 103 respondents said they still felt satisfied or prosperous even if their salaries dropped or stayed in the same in the past year.
Those with incomes closer to LSU’s famous head football coach were happier than minimum-wage earners, specifically people making more than $40,000 per year (73% of respondents).
“We don’t have the same situation you have in Detroit or in certain towns in Ohio or Florida or certain towns in California where they have terribly awful sub-prime market conditions,” says Jim Richardson, LSU professor of economics. “If you move around [our] city you wouldn’t yell, ‘Recession! Recession!’ because everything looks normal.”
Our normal is different than their normal.
Our normal, BRAC’s Knapp says, is compared not with the West or Midwest, but six other mostly comparable “peer cities”: Jackson, Miss.; Austin, Texas; the North Carolina area of Raleigh-Durham; Birmingham, Ala.; Little Rock, Ark.; and Mobile, Ala.
BRAC monitors a rolling average of job growth, and through last November, Baton Rouge fared well in 2008.
“We track data on them, all capital cities with similar size economies, some slightly larger, some more or less the same,” Knapp says. “Our peer cities had about .3% growth to our .8% growth.” And, he added, the United States had a negative .1% job loss during the same time.
A comparison of annual salaries for a variety of jobs in the Baton Rouge metro area versus their national averages.
1. Dentist
Baton Rouge: $122,920
National: $130,586
Difference: 7,666 Lower
2. Attorney
Baton Rouge: $77,257
National: $94,723
Difference: 17,466 Lower
3. Architect
Baton Rouge: $57,665
National: $66,277
Difference: 8,612 Lower
4. Professor
Baton Rouge: $53,110
National: $73,532
Difference: 20,422 Lower
5. Registered Nurse
Baton Rouge: $48,645
National: $56,242
Difference: 7,597 Lower
6. Advertising Executive
Baton Rouge: $45,363
National: $79,751
Difference: 34,388 Lower
7. Computer Programmer
Baton Rouge: $43,861
National: $61,372
Difference: 17,511 Lower
8. Marketing Specialist
Baton Rouge: $41,087
National: $52,794
Difference: 11,707 Lower
9. Teacher
Baton Rouge: $39,441
National: $44,137
Difference: 4,696 Lower
10. Plumber
Baton Rouge: $39,201
National: $41,881
Difference: 2,680 Lower
11. Football Coach
Baton Rouge: $37,451
National: $29,998
Difference: 7,453 Higher
12. Chef
Baton Rouge: $34,576
National: $47,012
Difference: 12,436 Lower
13. Photographer
Baton Rouge: $33,733
National: $40,726
Difference: 6,993 Lower
14. Medical Transcription Supervisor
Baton Rouge: $33,635
National: $36,860
Difference: 3,225 Lower
15. Entrepreneur/Small Business Owner
Baton Rouge: $33,285
National: $36,592
Difference: 3,307 Lower
16. Police Officer
Baton Rouge: $32,917
National: $49,228
Difference: 16,311 Lower
17. Administrative Assistant
Baton Rouge: $32,350
National: $38,075
Difference: 5,725 Lower
18. Detective
Baton Rouge: $28,100
National: $38,371
Difference: 10,271 Lower
19. Retail Manager
Baton Rouge: $27,872
National: $32,727
Difference: 4,855 Lower
20. Health Information Specialist
Baton Rouge: $25,601
National: $31,208
Difference: 5,607 Lower
21. Fire Fighter
Baton Rouge: $25,465
National: $38,485
Difference: 13,020 Lower
22. Bus Driver
Baton Rouge: $25,025
National: $32,375
Difference: 7,350 Lower
23. Event Planner
Baton Rouge: $24,803
National: $30,626
Difference: 5,823 Lower
24. Personal Trainer
Baton Rouge: $23,441
National: $24,881
Difference: 1,440 Lower
25. Mail Clerk
Baton Rouge: $18,740
National: $22,717
Difference: 3,977 Lower
26. Janitor
Baton Rouge: $16,923
National: $22,138
Difference: 5,215 Lower
SOURCE: Career Builder Salary, cbsalary.com
“This is what drives our optimism: that we’re still in a good position by comparison of where we are to where other places are.”
All of that could change through trickle-down problems. For example, elements of the auto industry buy products that are produced in Louisiana. Fewer cars sold by Detroit eventually will mean some kind of cutbacks and perhaps job losses here.
But based on cost-of-living indexes, what someone makes here is worth more than most places, especially in large metropolitan areas. And yet it’s middle-of-the-road compared to those peer cities. Your dollars in Baton Rouge go farther than in Austin, Raleigh-Durham and Mobile, but it’s cheaper to live in Birmingham, Little Rock and Jackson if you earn about $50,000 a year.
“Professors at LSU, for example, their pay for the most part is going to be competitive with other universities,” says Richardson—one of those professors. “There might be a change here or there, but for the most part, if we’re going to hire good people, we’ve got to pay them the same price.
“That’s regardless of cost of living,” he continues. “We pay our assistant football coaches just like any top team pays assistant football coaches. If you’re going to hire a good attorney, you’re going to pay him what you’d pay him in New Orleans or other cities in the South. I think profession by profession it’s not going to be out of line.”
Within the profession can be another story, especially when pay is public knowledge. Such was the case last October when the LSU student newspaper, The Daily Reveille, made available online what everyone at the university was paid.
“For the first week or two I’d get several e-mails a day and several calls,” Reveille editor Kyle Whitfield recalls. “Some people didn’t think it was legal.”
It was, of course, because LSU is a public university. Not that it wasn’t potentially painful to read the numbers.
“As a student, you know there are professors you have that are better professors than others,” Whitfield says. “But you look at the salary database, and you say, ‘Hey, this doesn’t add up. I have this professor who’s ten times better than that professor, yet he makes five times less.’ That’s an exaggeration, and I know salaries are based on more than what happens in the classroom. But there were some definite surprises.”
Some businesses also have been dealt surprises. For example, construction, both new and remodeling, was greatly affected by the hurricanes in 2005 and 2008. But now the overall economy has had its impact.
At his upscale developments, “those people are going to be able to afford it whether the interest rate goes up a tick or down a tick, but I’m being cautious,” says area developer and builder Darryl May. “I’m not building as aggressively as I used to. But everyone is doing this. We’re just having to work smarter and harder for what we used to make a while back. When the market gets tight you have to market better, brand better and build better.”
That includes the multitude of skilled workers and laborers in the area who are employed by people like May. He says he gets a lot more calls from sub-contractors than he used to, an indicator to him that work is not as readily available.
“They’re trying to work harder and weather the storm,” May says. “The good ones still make pretty much the same amount of money, and it’s pretty much the good ones who have work right now.”
One group that always has work is LSU and Southern students, especially in the food and beverage industry in a city where restaurants rule. Students are the lifeblood of the restaurant business, where they fill roles as hostesses, wait staff, cooks and bartenders.
Brandon Landry, co-owner and operator of Walk-On’s near campus, says employees can do very well as working college students. “Almost everyone we hire here has been born here or goes to school here. We have a crop right in our backyard to hire from,” says Landry, an LSU graduate himself.
Walk-On’s, now in its sixth year, has expanded to another location on Coursey Boulevard. Landry and partner Jack Warner also have three establishments downtown, employing a total of 280 people.
Landry says kitchen workers make two or three dollars per hour higher than minimum wage. A full-time cook makes $13 an hour at Walk-On’s, so with overtime, he or she could make nearly $30,000 a year. Bartenders, all of whom are promoted from within, make $600 to $700 on a midwinter week, but can haul in up to $1,500 a week during football season.
“You can go to school 15 hours a week and work here 25 hours a week and still make $30,000. And get a degree at the same time and have fun doing it,” Landry says. “Well, that’s not too bad.”
Those with degrees hope for more. A first-year public school teacher in East Baton Rouge Parish earns $42,013.
An LSU graduate with an engineering degree earns $78,860, while a person with an MBA should earn $45,600.
“Louisiana income is about 80% of the national average,” LSU’s Richardson says. “That takes into account the whole shebang, from the person making the most to the person making the least. We have a much larger number of people at the bottom of the income pile than the top of the income pile compared to the other states.”
Indeed, but next July the minimum wage goes up 70 cents—more than 10 percent—which most Baton Rougeans would be happy to take for a raise. Or to put it another way: that’s six fewer years of continuous minimum-wage work, 24/7, to reach Miles’ millions.
We asked a variety of Baton Rougeans how they feel about their salary and near-term prospects. Click here for their responses.
Click here for a sidebar on salaries.
Click here to see the results of the 225 survey. (PDF)
Click here to see who’s making the cash in Baton Rouge.
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