Tuesday is decision day for the monthly salaried employees offered an early retirement incentive.
The University mailed individualized packages in mid-October to 198 employees who meet the Rule of 75 and were identified to central administrators by their department leaders as qualified for the package.
As of Sunday, about 60 employees had decided to retire early, Executive Vice President Tallman Trask wrote in an e-mail. The retirees will save Duke “north of $5 million,” he said. Trask explained that it is difficult to estimate precisely how much the new retirees could save the University until decisions are final.
The monthly incentive has been offered to people with a wide range of salaries. The average salary is just under $70,000, Trask said, but including benefits and other costs the average amount each person could save the University is closer to $100,000.
The early retirement of 295 bi-weekly employees this summer reduced Duke’s expenses by about $15 to $20 million, Trask said in September.
Employees who accept the package will receive retiree health benefits, accrued vacation time up to 40 days and two weeks' salary for every year they have worked at Duke, up to 26 years.
Although the deadline for accepting the package is Dec. 8 at 5 p.m., employees will have until Dec. 15 to change their minds.
Board of Trustees Chair and Democratic state Sen. Dan Blue, Law ’73, said the latest round of retirements will “help tremendously” as the University tries to eliminate $70 million from its operating budget this year.
“You’ve got to keep the employees in mind as you do these things,” Blue said. “It’s an effort to be fair to the employees and give them an opportunity that they would not have otherwise gotten and at the same time address the financial questions in the University.”
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