ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the salary and remuneration mechanisms of academic faculty in the Israeli higher education system. It analyzes the impact of a uniform pay scale for academics in all public higher education institutions and the continuing budget cuts in the last two decades—on the gradual erosion of the working conditions of academics in Israel, the inability of universities to compete for faculty, and an immense brain-drain phenomenon. Also highlighted are some unique features of the Israeli higher education system, such as a clear differentiation between academic faculty employed at universities as compared to those employed in colleges, an inherent entitlement of sabbaticals for university academic faculty, and some other nonsalary benefits for productive faculty as well as a plan to establish 30 research-excellence centers from 2011 onward, to attract hundreds of leading Israeli researchers to repatriate back to Israel.
