I disagree with Christopher Whittle's suggestion that an increase in the popularity of museums would lead to an increase in museum salaries. Increased attendance COULD help justify REQUESTS for increases in salaries, but there isn't necessarily any direct correlation, nor are there any guarantees. The fact is that many major museums are enormously "popular" and accommodate great hordes of people: if anyone has the statistics to prove that salaries at those institutions are automatically higher than salaries at less "popular" museums, I'd love to see them. Call me an elitist or some sort of purist, but the notion that we should try to attract higher attendance by doing what is "popular" in order to increase our salaries bothers me. As everyone knows, the ways in which most museums are funded are complex. If you have substantial admission fees, obviously increased attendance can provide the funds and incentive to raise salaries, but it's not a sure thing. If you do build a highly enthused museum-going public, I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for them to call their politicians, out of gratitude, to request increased funding. The only reason most people would be willing to do that would be in the hope of lowering admission fees, and they certainly don't want to do anything that might increase their taxes. As others have already said, the way to get higher salaries across the board is to lobby for it. Do baseball players get obscene compensation because the fans request it? I don't think so. --David Haberstich