Posted by point counterpoint on January 24, 2003 at 15:56:57:
In Reply to: Re: Re: Houston Symphony Cutting Jobs, Salaries posted by wow on January 24, 2003 at 13:17:30:
you: "we are not talking about a pro athlete losing a little bit of money. We are talking about highly trained professional musicians here."
reply: true, but I am unclear what people with million-dollar-plus salaries has to do with Houston musicians receiving 64k+ base salary annually in a market where you can buy 100 acres of land with a house for under 200k. And to top it off, it sounds like you think there is no skill associated with athletics? Thats odd.
you: "Imagine if your company just cut 14 percent of your salary. You are used to making a certain amount and based on that you develop your standard of living. Now you are told you have 14 percent less. If you think it wont affect you anymore than it will affect them you are wrong."
reply: I don't need to "imagine", I just took a much more dramatic cut in pay (percentage-wise by a factor of three!) in accepting a new assignment. After, by all accounts, doing a stellar job for the previous project. The reason I accepted? It was the only choice given to me, apart from looking for work elsewhere. And for Silicon Valley, you still get the privilege of mortgages that are on average two-to-three times the cost of a market like Houston. There's more to maintaining a standard of living than simply picking up a paycheck every week...you bank your coin when you are doing well, and tighten your belt when times are lean. Thats not magic, it's reality.
you: "Just because these people make a good living, doesnt mean they can afford to make less.
Any adult with a mortgage from a typical lender generally pays 20-35% of their net income for their home. This is not a huge percentage. An average project manager's salary in Houston is like 45k, nearly 1/3 less than the permanent players in Houston's base salary!!? Highly-trained skilled professionals (albeit musicians) are not incapable of managing their finances. In that orchestra's market, most of the Houston community makes do with less, and the players are just as capable of doing so.
you: "And also remember that 4 people(well, string players) are going to lose their jobs. Thats a 100 percent loss of pay. That sucks for them a lot. Not to mention the fact that the orchestra will lose those string positions forever. This affects their product.
reply: You have no idea what you are talking about. The orchestra will hire, on a per-service-basis, players who will come in when the parts need to be covered. They always do that! The loss of four positions simply means that 4 additional string players are not guaranteed pay-for-services, whether they play or not! And the orchestra will actually sound BETTER as the personnel manager will be able to hire the best players per service instead of having to live with long-tenured, perhaps-no-longer-ready-for-prime-time-players!
you: "Anytime someting [sic] like this happens to someone, regardless of occupation, they deserve a little sympathy."
reply: Maybe you're right, but to assume they are incapable of responding to such a woeful tragedy does them little complement. And in a country where a lot of people are also coping with change, these orchestral players who allowed their contract to expire without exercising legitimate good-faith in preventing such an exposure (by GETTING a contract) have no one but themselves to blame for such a woeful state of affairs (note, most of my adjectives are being sarcastically chosen here)
To be sure, the state of affairs for orchestral players is a little shakey lately, and needs pragmatic, effective solutions. But to simply pay attention by (in effect) whining by proxy does no one any good.
dp