UK salaries are becoming an absolute joke: Warwick professor says govt university in India pays more

A UK professor working in the Department of Economics at the University of Warwick has criticised the company's salaries, especially for contractual staff. Anant Sudarshan said that that he has lost out on top talent because there is a government university in India that pays more. The associate professor shared his concerns on social media platform X highlighting his concerns about low salaries in academia.

Sudarshan said that salaries in the UK, even for highly skilled roles, have become low in absolute terms (actual monetary value) that they are losing out to offers from countries like India, which is typically seen as a lower-income country.

“UK salaries becoming a joke”

“UK salaries are becoming an absolute joke especially for contractual staff. I have failed to hire people eligible for the UKs special high potential individual visa because a government university in India is willing to pay them slightly more in absolute terms than here,” Anant Sudarshan wrote on X.



The professor further noted that the High Potential Individual (HPI) visa scheme is being undercut by poor salaries in the UK.

However, he said on average, UK salaries are still higher than those in India in absolute terms. “To be clear - there is no comparison in absolute terms on average and thus for most people (although PPP looks different). But on the margins, for the best people, the UK is now stunningly unattractive especially in academia,” Sudarshan explained.

He also talked about Purchasing Power Parity, which adjusts salaries for the cost of living, suggesting that while the cost of living in India might make higher salaries there more attractive, his focus is on absolute salaries.

“The UGC pay scales are much lower but individual project staff on short term contracts can get paid more. That said, many contract teachers in the UK pull in about 30k pounds. PPP that's about 7.5 lakhs annually,” the economics professor wrote in response to an X user’s query.

Racist backlash

Sudarshan faced racist backlash for his post with people asking him to "go back" or hire UK citizens for vacancies instead of recruiting foreigners.

The backlash highlights growing anti-immigrant sentiment in the UK and other parts of Europe.

“Maybe you should all go back!” read one comment under his post. “Whatever it takes. Go back,” another X account posted.

“Boo hoo. Hire citizens,” a third suggested, to which Sudarshan replied, “The point isn't whether someone is a citizen or not. The point is whoever is hired is paid too little - citizens don't get more!”