Bhikhari,

Harvard is in financial troubles and like most of the universities, Harvard also reducing the"tenured track" positions into "contract" type of positions. I don't know the salary level of an Associate Professor like Dr Shiva Gautam - so its hard to say how much he makes but like I said before Harvard is pretty stingy about "paying" its staff. I know few people who volunteer at "Harvard" for names sake (I guess).

Regarding research:

The university (I do not exactly know how much Harvard's overhead is) takes away as much as 75% of the total money you bring in. Suppose you bring in a million dollar grant, the university might take away 750 000 dollars and you will have to manage the staff and supplies etc with the remaining money. Once you are in Salary it does not really matter how many grants you bring in. You get the same salary.

As far as I know, apart from teaching responsibilities, the biostatiscians work closely with the researchers for desining the study (like determining the power), analyzing the data etc of the researches and are paid in the salary.

He is a biostatiscian - not a "lab rat".