The Universities Law prepared by the Community of Madrid can cost 200 million a year to the six public campuses of the region in its day to day. If the government presided over Isabel Díaz Ayuso approves the draft in the current terms in regards to the basic financing of the universities, the Madrid system will have gained 16 million euros in the current operations as a whole in 2023 to lose 180 million in its first year of application.
The jump is to move from having two deficit universities and four profitable to all present red numbers, according to An exhaustive analysis and a theoretical exercise carried out by Juan Hernández Armenteros and José Antonio Pérez García, professors of Economics at the Universities of Jaén and Polytechnic of València, respectively, and two of the main experts in university accounting in Spain.
Teachers have studied diverse indicators and the latest available data on university financing to analyze the evolution of recent years in the Spanish university, establish which communities put more means and which less, what do the main indicators on the performance of the centers say and project towards the future, on a theoretical exercise but based on real figures, how would the financing proposal affect the proposal of financing that includes the draft law of superior teachings, university and science of the community of Madrid public of the Rectors.
The detailed analysis of the situation of the past, present and probable future of the campus throws three ideas, explains Hernández Armenteros: Madrid is the autonomous community that worse finances its campus, it has no objective reason to do so (if for example I would like to justify that its budgets are the scarce for the low performance of the centers) and the situation will only get worse if the basic financing framework that collects its proposal of law applies.
The law that has prepared the Community of Madrid is technically complex, explains Hernández Armenteros, and is designed so that the expenditure of universities does not shoot. But it can be contraintuitive that will go from finance 57% of the expenditure of its universities to 70% and still the financing of current spending, of the day to day, will get worse, as the authors of the report maintain. This has its explanation in a change in transfers and in the possible use of the money contemplated by lesuc.
It is better understood with numbers. In 2023, the six Madrid public universities spent total 2,035 million euros. But the Community of Madrid only transferred 1,161 million euros. From there comes that 57% that the regional government contributes. If the new standard would be limited to saying that the regional executive will contribute 70% of university expenditure under the same conditions, there would be no problem. The Rectors would have more money at their disposal and the rectors would be happier.
But the draft includes several nuances. With the current regulations, the transfer of the Community of Madrid (those 1,161 million euros) can be allocated to any certificate of current spending (although in real terms money goes to payrolls). With the new one, the regional government changes the model. From its entry into force, if it does not change, the Executive will be to ensure the payment of payrolls through the simple formula of subtracting the total amount in salaries (which in Madrid was 1,269 million euros) revenues from rates and public prices (345 million euros) and cover the rest (with these figures, 924 million euros).
But those 924 million euros can only be used for payrolls and are not approaching the 70% contemplated by law (about 500 million euros would be missing). The trap, the teachers explain, is that this money until reaching 70% cannot be used for current spending. It will be a finalist capital, as established by law, that universities will have to use for what the regional government considers, which ensures control over university activity (for example, if you decide to finance only lines of research that result in interest to the Executive). The day to day will continue to be a deficient.
More than payrolls
The problem, the authors explain, is that this model does not contemplate that universities have more expenses than the payrolls of their permanent staff: cleaning services, light or gas supplies or the renewal of equipment are also needs, which are not included in the basic financing offered by Ayuso. But they also have more income, such as the provision of university services or the income from exploitation of the University's assets. However, these are scarce than expenses.
Again, translated into the real case of 2023: the six public universities had extra expenses (beyond payroll) of 311 million euros, while the revenues were 131 million. Conclusion: With the system proposed by the Regional Executive, which obvies all this part in its financing proposal, in 2023 the public campus set would have had a deficit of 179 million euros that cannot be attended with the money collected in the new law. With the draft law of Ayuso you can give the paradox that universities do not have money to open every day, but a box in box for projects that the Community of Madrid supports.
The authors also do the exercise of transferring these accounts to the whole of the country's universities: the 309.8 million euros of benefits that obtained the 47 Spanish public universities would become from one day to another in a deficit of 954 million euros, and all the centers would lose money, when they currently only do 12.
Far from alleviating the current financial failure, what would be caused would be the financial asphyxiation and the functional unfeasibility of public universities that are under their tutelage ”
Juan Hernández Armenteros and José Antonio Pérez
— Expert economists in university accounting
“Far from alleviating the current financial failure, what would be provoked would be financial suffocation and functional inviability of public universities that are under their tutelage” (from the Community of Madrid), economists write.
In addition, the other two financial elements contemplated by the bill will not help solve this insufficiency, the study authors tell. Neither the financing for specific needs (for example, if you have a World Heritage Campus, as in Alcalá de Henares) nor the game linked to objectives may compensate for the hole, they predict, nor will it do the possibility of creating investment funds contemplating the text, maneuver that the authors qualify as “toast to the laying”.
The least
Madrid presents the doubtful honor of having the worst public university in Spain: the regional executive barely covers 44% of the expenses of the Rey Juan Carlos University (URCJ). Madrid is the only region that allocates less euros for student and year of what he did in 2008.
“There is no objective reason that justifies the low financing of the Madrid university system, which is going to a situation of financial non -viability and will have to reduce resources,” says Hernández Armenteros. Moreover, in a system that currently does not have to cover payrolls, as denounced by the rectors of the six public centers. “Instead of having professors, you will hire associated professors. Instead of painting every five years, it will do so every 20. Instead of replacing teams every time, it will be done until they do not work,” he quotes some examples.
The study comes after several months of protests on campus in the face of the situation of financial suffocation of public universities. A lack of resources that has been dragging from the cuts that began after the 2008 mortgage crisis, of which, as this report demonstrates, the Madrid system has not yet been recovered. The situation is critical on campus, as the rectors of public universities repeatedly denounced repeatedly in recent months.
The information analysis also reveals that in the last 15 years the income of the Public Universities Service of the Community of Madrid has grown by 10%, which represents exactly half that those of the Spanish system as a whole (rose 20% between 2008 and 2023). In both cases it is less than what the nominal GDP has risen. In Madrid GDP has grown 46% in this period, which means that its contribution to universities has gone from 0.90% of 0.68% GDP.
When Hernández Armenteros says that “there is no reason that justifies the low financing” in Madrid that shows the statistics, the expert refers to the fact that the Madrid University has not reduced its performance in recent years, an argument to which the regional government could resort to argue its cuts. The study by the two professors indicates that both the teaching indicators (students by grade and/or master) and of research (funds captured or accredited sexenios) leave the Madrid University in nearby figures always – sometimes slightly slightly for excess and other default – to the national stockings.
