[Gsc-hca-family] [Fwd: The negative impact of 'Reasonable Compensation' policies at MIT on students with families]

[Gerald Dalley]

This message is intended for graduate students with families who receive 
outside funding (fellowship or other) in addition to TA or RA money.

The 'reasonable compenstation for RAs and TAs' policy at MIT requires 
that any RA or TA money that covers a tuition shortfall, be payed to the 
student at an institute mandated ratio of 36.5% stipend 63.5% tuition. 
The student is then responsible for paying back tuition from the 
stipend. If a student has a fellowship or outside funding source that 
pays more stipend vs. tuition than MIT's established ratio, than the 
student receives tuition payments in the form of stipend and he or she 
must report more income than is actually taken home. To offset the 
negative impact this might have on a student's tax liability, MIT 
subsidizes the excess stipend payment to account for 15% federal and 
5.3% MA taxes. 

While MIT makes a good faith effort to rectify the negative impact of 
this accounting policy on a student's tax liability, they have not 
addressed the negative impact this policy may have on students 
supporting a family. In particular, this falsely inflated inflated 
salary may reduce the eligibility of a student and their family for 
certain government subsidized programs such as:

subsidized or fully compensated health insurance for spouse and children
low-income housing
heating assistance
food assistance
etc.

The yearly fiscal impact of the policy on the student may be several 
thousands of dollars depending on family size, income, health etc., 
orders of magnitude larger than the effect of tax liability.

Todd Harris, chair of the HCA Task Force on Taxation, is compiling names 
of those affected in the above scenario and documenting the financial 
impact of the situation to present to the assistant provost. If you have 
been affected by MIT's accounting practices in any of the ways described 
above, please email Todd (tjharris at mit.edu <mailto:tjharris at mit.edu>). 
Our plan is to document and inform the provost of ways in which MIT's 
'reasonable compensation' policies are adversely affecting students with 
families, inform them of the students wish to have such policies amended 
or removed, and seek financial compensation for families who are 
affected. Thank you for your help in bringing this situation to light.

Sincerely,
Todd Harris

*
*
*Todd J. Harris*
Massachusetts Institute of Technology | 77 Massachusetts Ave. E19-582 
| Cambridge, MA 02139
Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology 
Laboratory for Multiscale Regenerative Technologies
web: lmrt.mit.edu
telephone: 617.959.1303
mail to: tjharris at mit.edu <mailto:tjharris at mit.edu>