It turns out that the highest earners in Ontario’s academic sector are the managers of the University of Toronto Asset Management Corporation (UTAM). President and CEO William Moriarty ranked third among the province’s top earners in 2015, pocketing a salary of $1.47 million.

UTAM manages some $7.4 billion in assets consisting of the University of Toronto’s employee pension funds, endowment fund, and short- and long-term operating funds. Two other members of Moriarty’s team ranked in the Top 20: Cameron Richards and Daren Smith, with salaries of $710,263 and $693,507 respectively.

Since 1996, the Ontario government has been legally bound to disclose the names and salaries of all public sector employees earning more than $100,000 a year. The disclosure threshold has remained unchanged for the last 20 years, and the so-called Sunshine List of high earners now includes public servants in government ministries, elected officials, health and education sector employees, and university and college employees across the province.

In 2015, a total of 115,431 public sector employees earned a salary above the disclosure threshold — a 3.6 per cent increase over the previous year.

Surprisingly, Western University president Amit Chakma didn’t make Ontario’s 2015 Sunshine List for public sector employees. The university confirmed in a press release that Chakma had volunteered to re­fund his 2015 salary to offset the double salary payment he received in 2014.

Last year, Chakma’s nearly $1-million salary raised eyebrows throughout academia. Following the controversy that erupted when the 2014 list was published, the university explained the double payment by stating that the president had opted to forego a year’s sabbatical and receive a payout instead.

Some of the best paid university executives who made the Top 200 list of high earners in the Ontario public sector are Mamdouh Shou­kri (York) with a salary of $463,105; Meric Gertler (Toronto) with $438,892; Franco Vaccarino (Guelph) with $423,648; Patrick Deane (Mc­Master) with $402,870; Feridun Hamdullahpur (Waterloo) with $400,000; and Allan Rock (Ottawa) with $395,500.

The annual revelation of publicly-funded salaries over $100,000 also showed that some deans are earning more than university presidents. For instance, John Kelton, dean and vice-president of the faculty of health sciences at McMaster University, earns more than his boss with a salary of $496,494. Similarly, Michael Strong, dean of the Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry at Western University, takes home $487,126.