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If the musicians weren't unionized, wouldn't they all be better off right now since they'd still be employed?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Either way, they’re shutting down. That’s not really a bargaining tactic. It’s failure mode.
No it’s a bargaining tactic. We won’t work for a dismal wage. It makes a statement. This failure is worth a lot.
These are professional musicians with real skills, each of them with many years of training. They walked because the best case scenario was their already meagre salaries being cut.
They weren't making dev salaries after a few months of a boot camp.
After years of dedicated study, the average salary for a symphony musician is about $70,000.[1] The San Antonio musicians already only made about half that to begin with[2] and then management cut that in half - base pay of a little over $17,000 a year.
And for the people claiming this was bargaining failure, no, this ended the failures. The bargaining failures happened over many years. Many years of accepting wage and benefit cuts over and over without making management offer something in return. They didn't bargain in the past. They just rolled over and showed their bellies.
[1] First link that popped out at me, but similar numbers in other places:
https://work.chron.com/pay-scale-average-member-orchestra-52...
[2] https://www.expressnews.com/entertainment/arts-culture/artic...
The reactions here so far are ridiculous. These are professional musicians with real skills, each of them with many years of training. They walked because the best case scenario was their already meagre salaries being cut. They weren't making dev salaries after a few months of a boot camp. After years of dedicated study, the average salary for a symphony musician is about $70,000.[1] The San Antonio musicians already…
I have a family member who has played in a couple different mid sized city professional orchestras. If you consider preparation and rehearsal time, the pay for either of them equates to less than minimum wage.
It's important to remember that this is a statement made by one party to a dispute, not a neutral statement of facts. It's unclear whether any of the claims made in the statement are true, or whether this is an intentionally destructive response to hard bargaining by the musicians.
You can see something similar with the "worker shortage". People don't want to do many jobs for what they're willing to pay. If workers had more leverage in bargaining, pay and benefits could rise to be worth doing.
I cannot believe the discussions occurring here surrounding professional musicians, people who have trained for years to hone their skills. I cannot believe that the attitude towards a union -"wouldn't they all be better now since they'd still be employed"? These are statements made by someone who never had to face the reality of the fact that sometimes a job offers so little money that you are BETTER off not working. The reality in many poor countries is that you could work for 5-10$ a day, but people choose not to work jobs but rather to engage in subsistence farming as that offers them at least food to survive, whereas the 5-10$ a day wouldn't. I cannot believe the narrow mindedness of such statements...
I found it offensive that I used to make more than someone playing in a symphony as someone working in retail. I found it offensive that I made more money in a week than they did in a month and all I did was peddle more garbage for people to buy to make themselves feel better about their empty pointless and gluttonous lives...
I feel sad that at this point this is where art is headed. Its shocking to see that art is potentially returning to the same dynamic that we saw in the Middle Ages - where some wealthy benefactor is needed to allow artists to continue their activity. Each time something like this happens we lose big chunks of what and who we are as a species. We're normalizing the death of art, of imagination and of beauty and assume that everything needs to have a monetary value attached to it, that everything needs to yield ROI. It's repulsive...
The reactions here so far are ridiculous. These are professional musicians with real skills, each of them with many years of training. They walked because the best case scenario was their already meagre salaries being cut. They weren't making dev salaries after a few months of a boot camp. After years of dedicated study, the average salary for a symphony musician is about $70,000.[1] The San Antonio musicians already…
$70,000 is a full time salary at a relatively successful symphony in a large city. It’s the symphonic musician’s equivalent of making it into the big leagues. Many more are part time and pay far far less. I have a family member who has played in a couple different mid sized city professional orchestras. If you consider preparation and rehearsal time, the pay for either of them equates to less than minimum wage.
You can make more busking on the street probably.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
$70,000 is a full time salary at a relatively successful symphony in a large city. It’s the symphonic musician’s equivalent of making it into the big leagues. Many more are part time and pay far far less. I have a family member who has played in a couple different mid sized city professional orchestras. If you consider preparation and rehearsal time, the pay for either of them equates to less than minimum wage.
Did you miss the part where op, said that's average not what they were getting in San Antonio. They were getting half that and then were cut down to 17k per year. You can make more busking on the street probably.
If the musicians weren't unionized, wouldn't they all be better off right now since they'd still be employed?
I mean there's a lot of unemployed musicians in San Antonio now....
They can drop the baggage (the board of directors), hire a marketing consultant and some ancillary staff, and maybe do other things with the arts in the area.
Seems to be some background here: https://sanantonioreport.org/san-antonio-symphony-2021-2022-...
Honestly from this article nobody comes off looking great: there are musicians refusing to accept fiscal reality on one side, and management acting in bad faith and firing the conductor out of spite on the other. Pity.
How far will you accept fiscal reality ?