With budget cuts causing concrete carnage throughout the state, it’s tempting to start slashing salaries and programs left and right. The impressive salaries higher education administrators currently earn are now on the chopping block. State Sen. Troy Hebert is on a hunt to save money by cutting some administrator’s salaries.”We are cutting into the meat now where programs and classes are going to be cut,” Hebert said. “The teaching staff are going to be cut also, but we have hundreds of administrative personnel [statewide] that make $100,000 per year.”It’s true some of the higher administrators here at LSU make enviable six-figure salaries. It seems obvious in the heat of the moment that trimming these numbers will save us money, and it seems highly unfair for these people to be earning huge sums while everyday workers are being laid off.It’s part of the “Wall Street cats” vs. “everyday Americans” mentality sweeping the country in the wake of the financial crisis.We’re not claiming every administrator earning six figures deserves them, but it’s important that salaries not be cut willy-nilly. Large salaries buy top talent and experience, and there is no time that talent and experience are more necessary than during times of crisis. The state can’t expect to pay small sums and expect to have skilled administrators.It’s certainly a perfect time to be carefully analyzing the salaries we’re paying our state employees, but that analysis has to be rational and systematic. If it is determined there are positions being grossly overpaid they need to be cut — but that can only happen after careful comparison with similar positions nationwide and after a measured asessment of performance.People’s salaries need to be cut if they are earning too much. But we can’t start cutting based on populist outrage alone._____Contact the editorial board at [email protected]