{"id":235,"date":"2007-03-07T15:08:08","date_gmt":"2007-03-07T23:08:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2007\/03\/07\/why-no-wage-competition\/"},"modified":"2013-02-07T18:02:59","modified_gmt":"2013-02-08T02:02:59","slug":"why-no-wage-competition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2007\/03\/07\/why-no-wage-competition\/","title":{"rendered":"why no wage competition?"},"content":{"rendered":"

I heard this story<\/a> on American Public Media’s Marketplace<\/em><\/a> a couple days ago, and it got me to thinking. Here are the salient points from the opening of the transcript of the radio story (emphasis<\/strong><\/em><\/font> is mine):<\/p>\n

John Plauche is a fourth-year associate at a top New York City law firm. He got a $20,000 raise last year. When his firm announced salary hikes across the board in January, he received another 20 grand. At 30 years old, he’s on $210,000 a year. He says he knows what’s behind his good fortune.<\/p>\n

“<\/strong>Wall Street and Wall Street bonuses.”<\/p>\n

He says firms like his do a lot of work for investment banks and hedge funds. Some lawyers end up defecting to work in-house at those companies. And pay at those places has been breaking records recently. That puts pressure on the law firms.<\/p>\n

“<\/em><\/font><\/strong>So to keep talent, basically, the law firms have to keep raising pay to keep up with Wall Street.”<\/em><\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n

That, he says, has a knock-on effect at elite firms across the country.<\/p>\n

Bill Urquhart agrees. He’s a senior partner at Los Angeles law firm Quinn Emanuel Urquhart Oliver and Hedges. After news of the New York raises rampaged across the Internet, his firm announced it would match the hikes.<\/p>\n

“<\/em><\/font><\/strong>For law firms like ours, you really don’t have a choice but to pay what the market is demanding you pay. Otherwise, you start either a quick or a long-term decline.”<\/em><\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n

He says he and his rivals are in a fierce battle for the best law-school students in the country. Once they’ve tapped those superior legal brains, they want to keep them.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This got me to thinking about how orchestra managers set out to negotiate wages and other parts of the collective bargaining agreement with musicians. Wouldn’t the typical manager want to both attract and retain the most highly sought-after musicians from other orchestras and the top music schools?<\/p>\n

When I joined the Oregon Symphony in 1995, we were right in the middle of the pack of ICSOM (I<\/strong>nternational C<\/strong>onference of S<\/strong>ymphony and O<\/strong>pera M<\/strong>usicians), with the base wage somewhere in the neighborhood of $35,000 per year for a section player. It was a enough to live on, as Portland’s real estate boom hadn’t yet begun.<\/p>\n

Now, as we are in yet another year without a contract (our last one expired weeks after agreed to), we find our positioning in the orchestral pay hierarchy slipping – we’re now right on the bottom third, and several orchestras have either passed us by on the way up or are right on our heels.<\/p>\n

Many of our auditions are frustrating experiences because other high-paying and more prestigious jobs are holding auditions at the same time or close by, and we lose the best of those who would ordinarily show up.<\/p>\n

We’re at a geographic disadvantage, too: it costs a lot to get to Portland, and we’re a long way away from the big East Coast centers of music. When we do hire an excellent young (or not so young) musician, they all almost immediately begin auditioning for other jobs, because they know that they can’t have a good standard of living in Portland on the wages we’re paid. Just as man doesn’t live on bread alone, the improved artistic standards of the orchestra don’t pay the mortgage or buy the groceries.<\/p>\n

Right now I feel totally at the mercy of the bottom line: every decision seems to be made based on how much it costs right this moment, not with an eye to how much this will bring in in the future. Short-term thinking only produces short-term solutions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I heard this story on American Public Media’s Marketplace a couple days ago, and it got me to thinking. Here are the salient points from the opening of the transcript of the radio story (emphasis is mine): John Plauche is a fourth-year associate at a top New York City law firm. He got a $20,000 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":303,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[55,3666,3662,62,3656],"class_list":["post-235","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-orchestra-world","tag-orchestra","tag-oregon","tag-portland","tag-symphony","tag-the-orchestra-world"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa8kC-3N","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":6347,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2011\/05\/10\/wall-street-journal-on-carnegie-series\/","url_meta":{"origin":235,"position":0},"title":"wall street journal on carnegie series","author":"Charles Noble","date":"May 10, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"From tomorrow's issue of the Wall Street Journal: Most of the concert offerings assembled by the orchestras are truly inventive, forging intriguing thematic links or presenting works considered dicey at the box office. On Wednesday, the Dallas Symphony will give the New York premiere of \"August 4, 1964\" for chorus,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "the orchestra world"","block_context":{"text":"the orchestra world","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/the-orchestra-world\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":668,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2008\/01\/17\/more-seattle-news\/","url_meta":{"origin":235,"position":1},"title":"more seattle news","author":"Charles Noble","date":"January 17, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"The Seattle Weekly has printed an article centering around the \"one-woman law firm\" of Brenda Little and her lawsuit against Gerard Schwarz and the Seattle Symphony on behalf of violinist Peter Kaman. Read the entire article here. Here's a tidbit: Tuxedo Disjunction Not every toxic work situation can be remedied\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "labor issues"","block_context":{"text":"labor issues","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/labor-issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4780,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2010\/06\/14\/regional-orchestras-dead-wood\/","url_meta":{"origin":235,"position":2},"title":"regional orchestras dead wood?","author":"Charles Noble","date":"June 14, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Terry Teachout has an article in the Wall Street Journal in which he basically says that if you've got a decent hi-fi at home then you are better off staying home than going to hear some \"third rate\" regional orchestra.\u00a0 What a load of crap. Regional orchestras provide relatively low\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "the orchestra world"","block_context":{"text":"the orchestra world","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/the-orchestra-world\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1079,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2008\/08\/27\/schnitzer-hall-upgrades\/","url_meta":{"origin":235,"position":3},"title":"schnitzer hall upgrades?","author":"Charles Noble","date":"August 27, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"This was in today's Daily Journal of Commerce: Changes in store for Schnitz, Main Street New RFP issued by MERC calls for designs of an \u00e2\u20ac\u02dciconic venue\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 next to hall to transform Main Street POSTED: 04:00 AM PDT Monday, August 25, 2008 BY SAM BENNETT The Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "fundraising"","block_context":{"text":"fundraising","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/fundraising\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"\u00c2\u00a9 Charles Noble","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/08\/5397030_e656dc7e35_b-400x266.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":674,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2008\/01\/19\/columbus-lost-at-sea\/","url_meta":{"origin":235,"position":4},"title":"columbus lost at sea?","author":"Charles Noble","date":"January 19, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"In a move which will likely result in the permanent crippling of a once fine orchestra, the management of the Columbus Symphony (Ohio) is proposing massive cuts of both orchestra personnel positions and the length of the season: the former down from 53 to 31 full-time musicians, the latter from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "labor issues"","block_context":{"text":"labor issues","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/labor-issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":297,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2007\/04\/27\/mstislav-rostropovich-1927-2007\/","url_meta":{"origin":235,"position":5},"title":"mstislav rostropovich, 1927 – 2007","author":"Charles Noble","date":"April 27, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"[click photo to enlarge] Photo [Reuters\/NYTimes]: Rostropovich pictured playing at Checkpoint Charlie after the fall of the Berlin Wall in December 1989. Rostropovich appeared with the Oregon Symphony only once during my tenure. He did a one night special with the orchestra, playing the venerable Dvorak Concerto. It was a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "the orchestra world"","block_context":{"text":"the orchestra world","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/the-orchestra-world\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Rostropovich plays at the fallen Berlin Wall - Reuters\/NYTimes","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/04\/27rost2450.thumbnail.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/303"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}