In Which I Make Awkward Transitions Between Topics: Salary Survey Update + Museos On Strike

Alas, I don't come bearing survey results. Though we are anxious to release the data, our resident statistics guru (that would be Kat) is busy crunching numbers and making pretty, pretty graphs. It takes a little time! We want to make sure everything is as good as it can be before we share any of it, but rest assured that you will see the first post on the subject this week.

I don't think any of us are expecting to be shocked by whatever the survey reveals to be the average museum salary. It's probably going to be low, but above the minimum wage. Right? Well that really depends on who responded. If some of the attendants at the National Gallery in London took the survey their pay--which is 60 pence per hour below a living wage--would certainly have an effect on the data. Their insultingly low wages plus long hours (between 50-60 hours per week) prompted them to stage a two hour walk out on Tuesday. Management has refused to negotiate with the striking members of the Public and Commercial Services Union, claiming that the museum cannot afford to pay them any more.

Of course that's the excuse. That's always going to be the excuse. As I said in a previous entry, museums are always going to have to make difficult decisions about where to allocate funds. If Museos don't speak out and insist that their labor is a valuable resource that's worthy of investment, then museums are always going to allocate their funds elsewhere. They're always going to be unable to afford to pay a decent wage. Not only must employees be valuable, but they also have to be willing to stand up and advocate for how valuable they are.

With their actions the attendants at the National Gallery have made the statement that they are valuable. They've demonstrated that their services are required. When they weren't on duty the museum had to shut the majority of its galleries! Museums need Museos even more than they need collections.

We first became aware of this strike via this post, Culture and a Living Wage. J at the Attic muses:

It seems to me to be a variation on the old conflation between intangible cultural value and economic free-market value. The argument is not so much that these workers just deserve to be paid for what they do, but that what they do is somehow worth more... Isn't it sad that museum workers have to resort to these arguments? Is as if we don't believe that our labour is equal to the labour of other workers, but that we have to somehow wrap ourselves in the aura of the art in order to ennoble and promote our work? Kind of like stay-at-home mums: they are valued not because their work is work, but because their work is connected to the sacred mysteries of raising the next generation...

We agree. Work is work. It should be fairly compensated regardless of its innate nobility or how much of a "dream job" it is.

Victory in Canada, Changes in France

A big congratulations to the workers at Ottawa's Museum of Civilization and War! Striking workers have reached a tentative agreement with museum management, one they say helps protect them from contracting out and helps ensure better job security. This is a hard won victory that comes at the end of 85 days on the picket lines. We wish them all the best; they deserve every gain they've won.

The civil service workers' strike that shut many French museums continues, but press coverage and tourist reactions were so unfavorable that strikers have changed their tactics. Instead of barring access, strikers are preventing tourists from paying for admission. This will hopefully quiet disgruntled tourists and a foreign press that seems unable to focus on anything except spoiled vacations, while still making an economic impact.

Kat and I have both found the coverage of the French strikes incredibly disheartening. Granted, neither of us speaks French so most of the articles we have access to are in the travel section of English language newspapers. These have been exclusively of the "Poor Mr. Wu from Ohio, he saved his pennies for a nice Paris vacation and now he can't even see the Mona Lisa! What a waste!" variety. The idea that the reason for the strike (the halving of the civil service workforce) was a legitimate one has rarely been mentioned. The job that museos do has been repeatedly equated with the tourism industry. While there is no doubt that many museum visitors are in fact tourists, museos do more than just point tourists (or other visitors!) towards the restrooms or operate attractions to keep them entertained. This is a genuine profession that requires a high level of education and skill. Objects need to be preserved. Research needs to be performed. History needs to be told. A halved workforce will only do this half as well, and future generations deserve better. The strike should be equated with the preservation of jobs and thus the preservation of human history. If Mr. Wu from Ohio needs to spend more of his Paris vacation sipping coffee at a cafe and less time crowding in front of the Mona Lisa for that to happen, then so be it.

Actively Organizing: A Lesson From Canada

Picketers from around the world in front of the Museum of Civilization and War. [via]

Museos all know the pitfalls of passive collecting: while you may end up with some great stuff, your collections will be uneven and incomplete. You might end up with all of one thing and none of another. If you are not continuously searching out the objects which will best further your museum's mission, you might fall into a collecting rut.

It seems that this blog has fallen into that rut. If I had been actively seeking news related to museum workers, wages, unions, and the employment situation, I might have been able to bring this story to your attention much sooner. Instead, I've been passively collecting and sharing links that I've stumbled upon. I've brought you a lot of one thing (links related to the general employment situation for young workers in nonprofits, for example) and none of another (stories about actual museos uniting).

In short, I'm feeling duly chastened. This is a huge story.

Workers at the Museum of Civilization and War in Ottawa Canada have been on strike for just over two months. You can follow news about the strike either on their union website (the museum is a national one, so workers can join the public servants' union) or on their Twitter, @MuseumWorkers. Despite their status as public servants, these workers have no job security, temporary contracts, and severely limited opportunities for advancement. They make significantly less than museum workers at other institutions, and have no protections against their jobs being contracted out. More specifics can be found here.

I don't know much about how these things work in Canada, but currently in the U.S. museos with union protection are either public servants or they work for an institution that has organized under the banner of a large labor union. Museum Educators at the Lower East Side Tenement Museum are trying to unionize under UAW Local 2110, a branch of the United Auto Workers. Museos at the New York Historical Society, Bronx Museum of the Arts, and the MoMA can also join this union. I don't want to dilute this entry with an additional topic, but you might notice that even if you can join a union (which most museos cannot, since we are not all public servants or the part of a large and unified workforce at a prominent institution), you are still liable to run up against unfair employment practices: you might still get unfair wages, you might still be denied benefits or job security. Unionization is not a cure-all, but it helps. We actually hear about injustices at these museums because there is a union to publicize them. Unions do not only provide the right to bargain, but they also provide a voice outside of the institution. Other museos do not have that voice.

And what a voice it is. The strike at the Museum of Civilization and War shows us a wonderful example of what collective action in a museum should look like. There is an incredible amount of solidarity on the picket lines, with workers from other museums, other industries, and other countries showing up to express support. Museum programming has continued, with the striking workers arranging an outdoor childrens' museum and a Halloween fair. They have chosen to demonstrate what a valuable service they provide not by denying the public that service, but by continuing to provide it.

So what can you do to help aid the cause of workplace fairness in museums?

• For starters, tell a friend. (Thank you Dan Cull, for blogging about this.)
  
• If you really want to go all out you can head to Canada and join the picket line like the admirable men and women from Pittsburgh and Germany who are pictured above.
  
• If you, like me, find yourself with less money and flex time than that, you can send an email to museum CEO Victor Rabinovitch. Let him know that you believe in equality of opportunity, fair salaries, and a healthy measure of employment protection.
  
• Perhaps most importantly, you can let the workers at the Museum of Civilization and War know that you stand with them. I for one think that they provide an excellent example of how to organize with grace and class, and I hope their demands are met in full.

I'll be following this story closely from now on.