Salary adjustments for scientific assistants
Good news for doctoral students: the Executive Board is lifting the present linking of their salaries to those of the Swiss National Science Foundation. Doctoral students, postdocs and scientific assistants I and II are therefore to receive the cost-of-living adjustment defined by the ETH Board for 2024. Moreover, the standard rate for doctoral students is rising by a total of 5%.
As you’ll recall, it was unclear at the end of 2022 whether doctoral students at ETH Zurich would receive a cost-of-living adjustment in the new year in the same way as other ETH staff. The reason was that these salaries are based on those of the Swiss National Science Foundation SNSF, which at that time had not yet issued any statement concerning a possible salary adjustment (see Internal news of 19 December 2022).
A few weeks later the SNSF confirmed that the research staff funded by it would receive a cost-of-living adjustment of 2.5% from 1 March 2023. The ETH Executive Board also agreed to this increase, albeit in the knowledge that this would not solve the problem permanently. This is now set to change as the salaries of scientific assistants (doctoral students and postdocs) are no longer linked to those of the SNSF. This means that in 2024 these ETH employees will also receive the cost-of-living adjustment set by the ETH Board, which is due to be announced by the ETH Board in early December 2023. The additional costs entailed by this for the departments will be financed by central transfers of funds.
Increase in standard rate
And there’s another piece of good news: the standard rate for doctoral students is being raised (including the cost-of-living adjustment) by 5.0%. At CHF 48,216 in the first year, this has until now been the lowest salary rate among doctoral students (see chart). This rate has hitherto been based on that of the SNSF and has remained unchanged since 2014.
“The Executive Board is aware that the standard rate has not been raised for some time and wishes to redress this situation. Around a third of all our doctoral students are paid according to this rate. By increasing it by 5% we wish to support these employees in the current challenging economic environment,” says Julia Dannath, Vice President for Personnel Development and Leadership.
“We are very grateful to the Executive Board for this gesture of support for doctoral students,” says Charles Ledoux, President of the Academic Association of Scientific Staff at ETH Zurich (AVETH). “The living conditions of doctoral students earning the standard rate are challenging, particularly among those with families. The reasons include high rents, transport costs, high costs of external childcare and the lack of any cost-of-living adjustment from 2015 until 2022. Any form of assistance is therefore most welcome.”
Higher hourly wage for teaching assistants
The Rectorate already increased the wage rate for teaching assistants back in September from CHF 28 to CHF 30.70 per hour. The new rate will apply as of the Spring Semester 2024, i.e. from 1 February 2024.
Continuation of working group
In order to find long-term solutions to the question of how ETH should structure its salary model in the future, Vice President Julia Dannath convened a working group with representatives from the departments and AVETH in January 2023. The group will be continuing its work in 2024 and wishes to highlight further options for the salary system of doctoral students and postdocs.
Always up to date
Would you like to always receive the most important internal information and news from ETH Zurich? Then subscribe to the "internal news" newsletter and visit Staffnet, the information portal for ETH employees.