While Uni Vice-Chancellors rake in millions, young researchers struggle to survive

by Jack Thrower

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Australia’s university Vice-Chancellors are among the highest paid in the world, while Australia’s PhD students are some of the lowest paid. That is not a sign of a healthy education system.

Australia’s higher education system is broken. University Vice-Chancellors – the CEOs of today’s corporatised higher education system – are among the highest paid in the world. Meanwhile, students suffer from expensive degrees, expanding debts and meagre income support, and staff are subjected to job insecurity, casualisation, hours of unpaid work and even outright employment law contraventions.

None of this is inevitable. Government choices matter, Australia created the current system, and Australia can create a better system that prioritises students and workers. Other countries have shown that this can work. In the words of Australia Institute Executive Director Richard Denniss

“…just consider the fact that in Norway, they tax the fossil fuel industry and give kids free university education, in Australia we subsidise the fossil fuel industry and charge kids a fortune to go to university.”

While Australian students are taking longer and longer to repay their debts, students in the Nordic countries (Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, and Iceland) attend university for free. Their Vice Chancellors (known as rektors in these countries) are not excessively remunerated.

Australia’s system is sometimes defended as necessary to attract managers talented enough to maintain or improve international rankings of our universities. Though these ranking systems are flawed in many ways, the Nordic countries show how universities can have high rankings without excessive Vice-Chancellor remuneration.

According the 2025 Times Higher Education World University Rankings, Australia and the Nordic countries have a similar number of universities that rank in the top 100, and also in the top 200. Australia has a similar population to the combined population of the Nordic countries.

Comparing universities in the top 100 by remuneration in the latest year of Australian data (2023) shows a stark difference between Australian and Nordic universities. Even the lowest paid Australian Vice-Chancellor, Dr Brian Schmidt of the Australian National University (who negotiated his salary down) was paid significantly more than even the highest paid equivalent at a Nordic university (Rector Henrik C. Wegener of the University of Copenhagen). Indeed, the pay for rectors of top-ranking Nordic universities is around the equivalent of $300,000 Australian dollars; this what Australian Vice-Chancellors received in 1985 (adjusted for inflation) before the deregulation and corporatisation of the sector.

Another stark area of contrast is pay for PhD students. In Australia, PhD candidates receive a tax-free stipend of $33,511; a higher stipend is possible but rarely paid in practice. This is substantially less than full-time minimum wage, which is about $47,800, or about $41,700 after taxes. To make matters worse, if an Australian PhD candidate goes part-time, they must start paying tax on their paltry stipends. Unsurprisingly PhD enrolments among domestic students has been declining.

The higher education policy of Nordic countries prioritises students rather than Vice-Chancellors. PhD students are recognised as employees and given a salary. These salaries mean that in Finland, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark, PhD students receive about double or more than students in Australia. Even Iceland, the Nordic country with the least generous PhD pay, the salary is roughly in line with the Australian full-time minimum wage.

The Universities Accord report, the largest review of Australia’s higher education sector in decades, recommended raising the PhD stipend and making the part-time stipend tax-free. Though the Albanese government has not ruled out this recommendation, it has also not yet committed to implementing it.

Australia’s higher education system is broken but it can be fixed. The Nordic countries show how another system is possible, one that prioritises students and staff over exorbitant pay for Vice-Chancellors. It’s time that the government learnt from these examples.

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