MIT Graduate Student Union

MIT can afford to give grad workers a living wage but chooses not to

review of MIT’s finances

MIT can afford to give grad workers a living wage but chooses not to

Over the course of May 2026–the final weeks of our union’s first contract–MIT repeatedly claimed an inability to give grad workers rights, benefits, and protections due to a time of financial stress. 

Below, we take a look into where MIT is putting their pennies. 

  1.  Funds for AI cameras while closing libraries

  2. MIT financials, bond rating, and cashflow

  3.  Enlightening stats from the FY2025 audit and FY2024 taxes

  4.  MIT grad workers make 76% of living wage in Boston

  5.  An analysis of the 3% fellows raise

  6. What to do if you feel like the stats don't match up with MIT's narrative

Funds for AI cameras while closing libraries

Beginning in the Fall of 2025, MIT spent $3 million on AI-enabled cameras. According to The Tech, these cameras are capable of “ automatically [classifying individuals] on the basis of clothing color, gender, and age, up to a distance of 35 feet (11 meters) from the camera.” 

Here are some of the locations where MIT has invested in using AI to classify you: 

At the exact time as this project was being developed, President Sally Kornbluth announced in November 2025 that federal funding cuts meant the closure of MIT libraries and resources. This led to the abrupt and unjust firing of many MIT library workers. 

On June 12 at 6pm, Dewey Library—1 of 5 libraries at our world-class educational institution— closed permanently. MIT instructor and alum Elizabeth Cavicchi describes these closures in the MIT Faculty Newsletter as “a significant retreat from that commitment to truth and knowledge”.

MIT financials, bond rating, and cashflow

From the 2025 Treasurers’ Report, we read that MIT’s finances and endowment are among the strongest in the country and MIT enjoys a remarkably favorable bond rating. In fact, net assets of $37,675.7 million at fiscal year (FY) 2025 close were 12.3 percent higher than the previous year. 

S&P and Moody’s rated MIT and MIT bonds as AAA in May 2025 based on a strong financial outlook. AAA is the highest rating assigned by S&P Global Ratings, and an AAA Moody’s rating indicates “the borrower has an exceptional capacity to meet its financial commitments and is virtually immune to default”.

“The stable outlook reflects our expectation that in the near term, MIT will maintain its excellent demand characteristics, positive operating performance, and robust financial resources. We anticipate that operating performance could be strained due to changes in federal funding while management proceeds with efforts to reduce expenses. The outlook also reflects our expectation that any debt issuance will be balanced, with commensurate growth in resources.”

Enlightening stats from the FY2025 audit and FY2024 taxes

In October 2025, PricewaterhouseCoopers published an independent financial audit for the 2024-2025 FY. This is a requirement under the Uniform Guidance, which mandates audits of entities expending significant federal funds in the U.S.

We encourage curious graduate workers to become acquainted with MIT’s financial practices using these reports. Historically, documents detailing MIT PI’s donation sources (”Brown Books”) were public until they were silently taken down in 2025. It is a priority of many GSU members that our access be reinstated so that graduate workers can fully understand the impacts and purposes of our research. If you share this interest, please reach out to your department stewards. 

Table 3 - Student Support under Chapter I - Financial Reports, Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements shows that “student support” in the form of tuition, fellowship, and employment across undergrads and grads cost a total of $829 million, $638 million coming from Institute sources. 

As a non-profit, MIT’s tax returns are also public record. From their form 990, we can see how much the highest-paid employees make, among other data.

2024 Compensation as reported from MIT’s form 990 shows the highest paid employee is Seth Alexander, president of the MIT Investment Management Company (MITIM Co.). MITIM Co. was created in 2004 to “steward MIT’s long-term investments”, and Seth Alexander has served as president since 2006. 

We also find from form 990 that MIT’s mission is: 

“TO ADVANCE KNOWLEDGE AND EDUCATE STUDENTS IN SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, AND OTHER AREAS OF SCHOLARSHIP THAT WILL BEST SERVE THE NATION AND THE WORLD IN THE 21ST CENTURY.”

MIT grad workers make 76% of living wage in Boston

MIT pays grad workers $51,226 minimum, which is 76% of the living wage in Boston by MIT’s own living wage calculator.

The median rent for a 2-bedroom unit in the Cambridge area is estimated at $2,941 /  mo. The GSC cost of living survey reports that in Jan 2025 the median single grad student spent $1,500 in rent. The corresponding yearly income to clear the rent burden threshold (30% of income) is $58,820/year.

To think about what would be a reasonable wage to ask for, we consider how much our fellow grad workers at peer institutions make. Across the private, research-focused grad schools listed in the table below, grad workers make between 86% and 104% of the living wage in their respective cities.

To make up the gap to living wage, MIT would have to pay about $10k more per grad student, or about $50M total, which is approximately equal to the money MIT made in tuition alone from graduate workers with external fellowships ($59.3M).

A raise of this magnitude would represent 1.07% of MIT’s total expenses in 2025, a year in which MIT’s net assets increased by $4.2B, the majority of which came with no donor restrictions.

MIT makes more money ($112M) from executive and professional education programs than it spends on fellowship stipends ($70M) or student employment ($65M, including undergraduate and hourly appointments). In other words, MIT makes more money from executive programs than all internal and external fellowship stipends combined plus a 20% raise.

An analysis of the 3% fellows raise

On May 18th, David Darmofal, Vice Chancellor for Graduate and Undergraduate Education, sent out an email titled “AY27 stipend levels, health insurance, and additional support.” In this email, it was announced that MIT would be giving a 3% raise to fellows only. 

  • This raise is less than any of the three previous raises gained through our first contract (5.4%, 3.5% and 3.25% over the past 3 years, respectively).

  • Going into AY27, MIT reports that they will raise graduate housing rent by a weighted average of 3.5%. 

  • The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported a 4.2% rate of inflation for May 2026, this number will likely remain high through the year as effects from the U.S. war on Iran percolate to other sectors.

The email left out the mention of back pay, the difference in wages that MIT will owe us for our work in the time between contracts. This is a standard practice in unionized workplaces. A fair second contract will include stipend increases that are greater than 3%, applied retroactively to June 1, 2026.

A 3% raise for every grad worker (not just fellows) totals to an additional $7.4M / yr.

To put this in perspective:

  • MIT spent $2.09B on total (including staff & faculty) salaries and wages in 2025. $7.4M /yr represents 0.35% of this amount.

  • The 2025 operating budget (total money spent by the institution) was $5.1B. $7.4M /yr is 0.14% of all the money spent in 2025. 

  • $7.4M is 0.02% of the total endowment or 0.01% of the $7.21B in unrestricted endowment funds as of 2024.

As of June 4th, department-level information and implementation of the 3% fellows raise was missing from many departments, including the Department of Chemical Engineering and Nuclear Science and Engineering. 

Additionally, on June 1st, MIT rejected the GSU’s proposal to extend the contract through the summer with the 3% raise extended to all graduate workers. 

MIT has repeatedly used fellows exclusion from the bargaining unit as a tool to unpredictably change pay structures and deny fellows the opportunity to use the collective power of grad workers to have a voice in their working conditions. 

Without fellows inclusion, MIT can spontaneously choose to grant and rescind arbitrary % raises for workers outside the bargaining unit. In bargaining our second contract, the GSU is putting forward proposals for industry-standard raises and for fellows inclusion in the bargaining unit so that we can ensure financial security for all graduate workers. 

6. Feel like the stats don't match up with MIT's narrative? 

We encourage curious graduate workers to become acquainted with MIT’s financial practices using these reports. Historically, documents detailing MIT PI’s donation sources (”Brown Books”) were public until they were silently taken down in 2025. It is a priority of many GSU members that our access be reinstated so that graduate workers can fully understand the impacts and purposes of our research. If you share this interest, please reach out to your department stewards and join the Contract Action Team.