Hear hear! Very nicely said!  Thank you.
--- Carol Ely <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Dear colleagues:
>
> I've been reading Museum-L for about 6 years, and
> periodically the
> salaries topic comes up, the same discussions are
> brought out, and the
> thread fades out again, only to recur. Lately the
> topic has been coming
> around more and more often, and I think I know why -
> because IT IS A
> REAL PROBLEM.
>
> Yes, we know museum workers are underpaid. The
> question is do we accept
> it, or work to change it. I suggest that this real
> problem needs to be
> really dealt with by the profession as a whole.
> Culture usually requires
> subsidy, either from government, or advertising -
> but in the case of
> museums, this subsidy comes from the profession
> itself, in the form of
> its workers consistently accepting less for their
> skills than they could
> get elsewhere. In other underpaid arts fields, there
> is at least the
> hope of an economic breakthrough, because there is
> ownership of
> intellectual property, or performance - the play
> might go to Broadway,
> the film might be picked up by Miramax, the book
> might make the
> bestseller list. Not so in museum work - we hold the
> cultural heritage
> of others in trust.
>
> Once upon a time museum workers were people whose
> families had the money
> to subsidize their interests. Then the field
> professionalized, and these
> new, expensively trained workers, were expected to
> survive on the same
> low salaries that prevailed. Their "passion" for
> their work drove them
> to it, though it did not make economic sense. And it
> looked good when
> the alternative was waiting tables, because there
> were few good jobs.
>
> Now that the unemployment rate is so low, it makes
> less and less sense
> to young workers to choose such a low paying field
> when other
> opportunities beckon. This should be seen as a
> problem for the
> profession - we need the best and the brightest
> minds.
>
> Many of the complaints and many of the rebuttals
> have come from the
> younger members of the list. They face the stark
> reality - and though
> they may have "known" about the low salaries, they
> may not have felt
> what that meant until they couldn't find a place to
> live, the car broke
> down, and there was no insurance. And though some of
> them defend the low
> salaries as necessary and not important to their
> sense of values -
> surely they are assuming that it will get better as
> they gain experience
> and move up the job ladder. Well, it may, or may
> not, and if the
> profession doesn't deal with the REAL problem of low
> salaries, it won't
> get better by much.
>
> It will come to look like a problem when you are 40,
> trying to raise
> children (or did you know that you chose the job
> over having children?)
> on a low salary, wanting the best for them (like an
> education they can't
> get from the marginal schools in the marginal
> neighborhood your salary
> allows you), or maybe your spouse, with the better
> for-profit-sector
> salary that has been subsidizing YOU leaves you, or
> perhaps you have
> health problems (insurance, anyone?). And then maybe
> you are 65, and -
> whoops! no pension! none at all! - have you been
> donating to your IRA
> since you were 22, on your low museum salary?
>
> Other non-profits DO find ways to compensate their
> workers. No one
> expects lavish, but liveable is non-negotiable. Or
> should be. When
> teacher salaries were low, it was a national
> disgrace, and something was
> done, even though it was "unaffordable". Now compare
> what a teacher with
> experience and a master's degree gets in salary and
> benefits, and what a
> museum educator with experience and a master's
> degree gets. Done
> laughing yet?
>
> I don't have the answers. I'm not bitter, I chose
> this profession, have
> worked in and out of museums for 22 years, I still
> believe in it, I
> still stick with it. And I still think salaries are
> too low overall.
>
> But I don't think there will be answers until it is
> acknowledged as a
> PROBLEM that we should collectively pool our ideas
> to solve, and make a
> commitment to upgrading museum salaries, by whatever
> means are
> necessary. This is not something we should have to
> apologize for. It
> will take creativity, and advocacy, and anger - but
> look at the other
> impossible things we do in museums every day!
>
> Carol Ely
> Ph.D., Museum Consultant
> Louisville
>
>
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