14 · ARL Annual Salary Survey 2007–2008 The pattern of relationships between rank and salary seen in past years continues, where higher rank is associated with higher average years of experience and a higher salary. 6,104 of the 9,983 librarians in ARL university member libraries occupy a rank within these three most commonly found ranking systems, and the largest number of professionals (3,437) occupies a rank in a four-step rank structure. Figure 4 Average Salaries and Average Years of Experience of Library Professionals In Libraries with Three, Four, and Five Step Rank Structures FY 2007–2008 Three-Step Four-Step Five-Step Salary Experience Salary Experience Salary Experience Librarian 1 52,906 8.0 50,034 7.7 47,956 9.3 Librarian 2 63,819 16.3 54,505 11.4 56,907 14.5 Librarian 3 83,478 24.8 68,114 20.2 63,749 18.0 Librarian 4 84,864 26.5 80,299 24.6 Librarian 5 91,577 27.2 No. of Staff 1,351 3,437 1,127 Inflation Effect Tables 2 and 6 reveal changes in beginning professional and median salaries, as well as changes in the U.S. Bureau of Labor’s Cost of Living Index (CPI-U) for university and nonuniversity research libraries. Table 3 is similar to Table 2, but reports data only on U.S. libraries. Table 4 shows trend data for Canadian libraries and compares them to the Canadian Consumer Price Index changes. Tables 2, 3, and 4 include law and medical library staff in ARL university libraries. All tables indicate that the purchasing power of professionals working in ARL libraries is keeping up with inflation. For a second consecutive year, the median U.S. salary has been exceeded by the median Canadian salary converted to U.S. dollars. The median salary for all ARL university libraries was $61,833 in 2007–2008 for U.S. libraries only it was $61,329 and for Canadian libraries converted into U.S. dollars it was $67,331, or a median of $76,239 Canadian dollars. In addition to the gains made by the Canadian dollar against the U.S. dollar, Canadian salaries also increased sharply when denominated in Canadian dollars, by 3.9% (Table 4), while U.S. salaries increased 3.5% (Table 3). The median salary for combined U.S. and Canadian university libraries increased 3.6% (Table 2) At the same time, the U.S. Consumer Price Index increased 2.4% in the last year and the Canadian Consumer Price Index increased 2.5%. Beginning salaries in the university sector continue to increase at a steady rate. The median beginning salary in ARL university libraries increased to $41,125 this 2.8% is almost half the 5.5% increase reported in 2006–2007. After a 10.6% jump in 2006–2007, the median beginning salary for ARL nonuniversity research libraries increased by only 3.7% to $44,359. Table 6 reveals that the median salary for nonuniversity staff has increased about 0.2% since 2006–2007, to $80,261. Libraries need staff with high-level technical skills to operate at the more sophisticated and complex information environments that are in place. As people are hired with higher beginning salaries, the inability