What happened?

[tbn.al]

In the early seventies I made about $6,000 a year as a new public school music teacher. A New York Philharmonic gig was worth an average in the mid twenties. A professional baseball player averaged just slightly more. A couple of years ago the baseball average was over 3 million, the average NY Phil player was barely in six figures and a high school band/orchestra/choir director was less than half of that. I love baseball, don't get me wrong, but how did we get to this place?

[graybach]

In the early seventies I made about $6,000 a year as a new public school music teacher. A New York Philharmonic gig was worth an average in the mid twenties. A professional baseball player averaged just slightly more. A couple of years ago the baseball average was over 3 million, the average NY Phil player was barely in six figures and a high school band/orchestra/choir director was less than half of that. I love baseball, don't get me wrong, but how did we get to this place?

It's not in one sense that people are paid what they are intrinsically worth. It's market demand, and one could argue that our values are skewed, but not everyone shares our values as musicians/the arts, teachers, etc. In the other sense, we do assign value to certain vocations by what we spend our money on, but it all comes down to market demand.
This quote is from a famous personality who is controversial. I purposefully did not name him/her because I don't want the value of what he/she said diminished by people who hold a negative opinion of him/her. I think it explains it well.

"You know, ... people have complained to me about how much athletes make versus how little teachers make, and they want to talk about the relative importance of the two vocations.

I say, "Well, how many people pay to watch a teacher work?" Nobody pays. In fact, you have to be forced into the room where the teacher is. They have to make you go there -- and then once you're in there, you are a prisoner. You choose to go to an athletic arena. You pay to get in there or what have you. The difference is revenue generation versus revenue expenditure in a capitalistic system. If you want to start assigning moral value, that's one thing; but then you're going to have to have some tribunal set up to determine who gets what. Equal pay for equal work? Who's gonna decide what job is as important as another? Well, there are people who want a government agency to do that based on their view of morality -- you know, what's important and what isn't.

Some people are profoundly offended that Alex Rodriguez makes what he makes. Well, the dirty little secret is that Alex Rodriguez is generating far more than what he makes. It's the same thing with any star athlete. I've told people who have asked me this, I've said, "You know, one of the most direct routes, if you want it, to high income is commission sales." You get yourself in the revenue stream of some corporate entity, business entity, and you make yourself responsible -- personally, directly responsible -- for a portion of the income that enterprise generates, and you're going to be compensated for it when you are directly responsible. Commission sales offers one of the greatest opportunities out there. Now, there are pitfalls in it, and there are rotten managers -- everything's relative; you know, it's not magic -- but that's essentially what athletes are you when you get down to brass tacks. how it could be that a professional athlete is in commissioned sales. Look at it this way. It's a stretch, I mean Alex Rodriguez is paid, or any high paying athlete is paid based on a number of things: leverage, what they can demand, how much they generate, so forth and so on. That is the key. Now, Alex Rodriguez is not a salesman per se, but his high level performance generates interest in the sale of tickets to the ballpark, to subscriptions to the Yankees cable network, to the sale of tickets in every ballpark the Yankees go to. Rodriguez, because of all that he's become -- he's a gossip column celebrity, he's a professional baseball player that happens to be pretty good -- there are a whole bunch of reasons why he attracts attention and why people are willing to part with money to be where he is, to watch him do what he does. And in a sense he's compensated for that.

He's not paid simply because he's good at what he does. Being good at what he does generates a whole lot of revenue for a whole lot of people, and he simply gets a percentage of it. He's a percentage player, and you could argue that maybe he deserves even more. Others would say, "Nah, look, $25 million here, nobody needs more than that." That's not the question. Who needs what is not the question. You want to talk about fairness, who's generating all this revenue that all these people are making? The people generating it should get a percentage of it. This is why, folks, when you start talking about public sector employees, they're not generating anything. Now, they are performing a service. They are teaching, or they're doing whatever, but they're not generating revenue. This is not to denigrate them. We're simply talking here about the differences in why and how certain people get paid."

[tbn.al]

You missed my point. I understand why it works the way it does all too well. I left teaching to become a commissioned salesman because I understand how it works. My question is, how did our society get to the point that the relative worth is what it is today? How did our values get to this place? What happened?

[PMeuph]

It would certainly take a whole book to answer the question you are asking...

Here are some of my thoughts (in an abridged version):

-People have become escapist. They see life as being better elsewhere so they are always in search of something new, something shiny something impressive. This, in my opinion, is why pop culture sells. Just think of all the "stories" being told about pop musicians/actors/entertainers these days. The idea of "overnight stardom" has become the norm.
-Hard work is not what anyone wants. People want the app, the clip notes, the abridged version. They don't want to read Shakespeare and parse through the somewhat antiquated vocabulary, they want the version with garden gnomes and the music of Elton John.
-Money and Happiness have been equated with each other...
-The added technology has made selling a product to several million people at the same time a breeze. Just think of eBay, Amazon, and even (albeit more limited in operation) Tubenet's for sale section, etc. You can now buy a product from around the world and have to our doorstep in less than a week( if you pay the right shipping) And not just a product, but pretty much any item you could ever want.

My observations are in no means complete, they are just the tip of the iceberg.

[pwhitaker]

Supporting the "dumbing down" hypothesis are the sad facts that NASCAR has supplanted both baseball and the NFl as America's pastime and, of course, the inexplicable continuing appeal of rap "music".

[graybach]

The gradual dumbing down of society. See where the public's entertainment dollar is most often spent. It ain't on orchestra tickets. The general public really is the uneducated masses. Uncultured, base, and self-serving. More people spend their money on sports because that appeals to the masses on an educational and cultural level. Popular music has done the same thing. People's ever-decreasing attention spans fit well with 2:20min radio tunes that have simple lyrics and little melody, making "classical" music a chore, a bother, and too much for the busy life. That's the short answer. The long answer is the same thing, but like a lengthy dissertation with the same basic premise.

+1 Doc. Good analysis...

I tend to think that NASCAR has popularity because of the times the NFL and MLB and NBA have had strikes/lockouts. The general public sees a bunch of spoiled rotten, crybaby (in their eyes) overpaid athletes and owners whining and moaning and making millions doing it, and the public does not resonate with that because ordinary people live paycheck-to-paycheck.
I'll have to disagree with your assessment of NASCAR, though. I believe it takes just as much or more skill to drive a car at 200 miles an hour for 300+ miles while jockeying for position with equally skilled drivers and having part of your success depend on the pit crew and their skills, making decisions whether to pit or not, which could make you run out of gas, and also being dependent on the people who built the car to make sure you have a car that will even run all day than it does to run up and down a court and put a basketball in a circular hoop, hit a ball with a glorified stick, or run down a field into the-end zone. It's just that NASCAR's fans, in our politically correct world, are among the last left which can be made fun of without fear of the PC crowd coming after you. They're also among the last left who can laugh at themselves (ie Jeff Foxworthy and his redneck jokes) and don't mind others making fun of them. People in PC groups cannot laugh at themselves and cry like babies if someone says a word about them...

[graybach]

Another factor is that our rulers have manipulated our schools (via centralized control of curriculum through requirements and through a culture of "educationalism" in our colleges and universities) until what our schools do approaches worthlessness. Thus, those who work in public schools are also (as far as those who receive the diminished quality of services are concerned) worth $ less.

bloke "It is very....VERY sad indeed."

Bloke, agreed. And, not only what you said, but a lot of administrations, (and states) are "top-heavy" and the money never makes it into the classroom because it goes into the pockets of the many excess and redundant administrators, who turn around and blame teachers for everything. I have several relatives and friends who teach, and I also used to, and I see (and saw) a lot of micromanagement and what seemed to me excess work for the teachers to make administrators look like they were doing something, in other words, justifying their jobs...

[ckalaher1]

How did baseball salaries become so huge?

Ownership has huge profit margins due to subsidized ballparks, their ownership of parking facilities, food and drink sold at games, and the public's demand for tickets to attend games.

As to why other pay scales have not risen at the same clip of baseball players, it all comes down to public demand. It's not just teacher's and performer's salaries that have remained stagnant when compared to baseball player's salaries, as it's pretty much the same in every other walk of life. I'm sure there are many ditch diggers and 7-11 managers who would like to know how someone gets paid to sit in the back of an orchestra and make a decent living. I certainly don't subscribe to or believe in that line of thought either, as those who have performing jobs or teaching jobs are professional folks who have studied and prepared more than adequately to perform their given tasks, just the same as Albert Pujols et al.

Capitalism. What can you do.....hard to tell preople what to do with their discretionary spending I suppose.

[Dan Schultz]

You missed my point. I understand why it works the way it does all too well. I left teaching to become a commissioned salesman because I understand how it works. My question is, how did our society get to the point that the relative worth is what it is today? How did our values get to this place? What happened?

How much you make is directly related to what you sell and how good you are at it. But... regardless... you'll never earn the salary of a major league baseball player. I think it sort of sucks, too.

I suppose the only way I can come close to justifying the high dollars that sports figures get is the fact that at age forty, most of them are too 'busted up' to have a descent life. Most seen to die earlier and live in poverty their final years.

[bort]

I suppose the only way I can come close to justifying the high dollars that sports figures get is the fact that at age forty, most of them are too 'busted up' to have a descent life. Most seen to die earlier and live in poverty their final years.

Also, they are in the spotlight 24/7, and are as much representatives of their city as they are of their team. And they must remain in top physical condition or lose their job. It's certainly not easy. I'm sure there's a lot of fun to it, but it's certainly not easy.

Funny enough, just like music, it's not something that people ever set out to do because they want to get rich. They do what they love, and if lucky enough, they'll make a good living at it.

[bort]

Regarding teachers, yes, I think many good teachers are underpaid. But money isn't the solution.

I forget the exact statistic, but a lot of teachers even say that the money isn't the problem. They would gladly perform and enjoy their job more with better support from schools/districts, and with *better behaved* kids.

I think the real epidemic is the a huge lack of parenting and personal accountability.

[Dan Schultz]

Regarding teachers, yes, I think many good teachers are underpaid. But money isn't the solution.

I forget the exact statistic, but a lot of teachers even say that the money isn't the problem. They would gladly perform and enjoy their job more with better support from schools/districts, and with *better behaved* kids.

I think the real epidemic is the a huge lack of parenting and personal accountability.

+1

The fellow who directs my community band is probably the best middle school band teacher/director I've ever known. This individual is worth LOTS more than he is paid. He subscribes to what Bort said above. I think this guy would work for nothing if he didn't have things in his life that need money to pay for,

The sad reality is though... I know other teachers who aren't worth HALF of what they are paid!

[ckalaher1]

How did baseball salaries become so huge?

Ownership has huge profit margins due to subsidized ballparks, their ownership of parking facilities, food and drink sold at games, and the public's demand for tickets to attend games.

I just couldn't possibly care less about this. I consume -zero- of this product/service.


I don't consume any of this either, just pointing out via the listed reasons why their employees make higher salaries. If one could replace "ownership" with "symphony management", then performers would most likely have seen a sharp salary increase over the years, just as pro sports participants have.

I should have clarified in an earlier post.

[Dan Schultz]

This individual is worth LOTS more than he is paid.

Unless that individual has pursued higher pay, been offered higher pay, and turned it down, that individual is probably paid nearly exactly what they are worth.

That's not quite what I meant. He's worth more than teachers who are making the same pay but doing less. It's just a shame that we can't pay teachers based on their individual merit.

Indiana just abandoned the 'no child left behind' bill because it was killing individual incentive.

[Brian C]

I think everyone has missed the most important point: the advent of free agency in baseball. Orchestras and public school teaching jobs remain largely unionized.

[PMeuph]

I think everyone has missed the most important point: the advent of free agency in baseball. Orchestras and public school teaching jobs remain largely unionized.

Really? Everyone? After all the OP's main question is as follows:

My question is, how did our society get to the point that the relative worth is what it is today? How did our values get to this place? What happened?

IMHO, this thread has largely nothing to do with Baseball, Teaching, or Symphony Orchestras. The op just used those examples because they're three convenient figures that most of us could relate to and that data could be obtained for...

[tbn.al]

quote "IMHO, this thread has largely nothing to do with Baseball, Teaching, or Symphony Orchestras. The op just used those examples because they're three convenient figures that most of us could relate to and that data could be obtained for..."

Actually the op's question stemmed from a conversation with another musician concerning symphony orchestra concert attendance figures. It IS about the music, or at least society's preference of things that require very little from the user for our entertainment outlets. Hence we see the devaluation of activities that require mental effort. Perception rather than substance has become king. Our society as a whole has been trained by the media to believe that producing or listening to classical music is boring. Therefore "fun" stuff like athlectics, baseball is just an example, occupies the top revenue positions for said media. Pop music also shares the stage, but not so much classical anymore. I remember a often quoted line from American Bandstand in the 60's, " It's got a good beat. You can dance to it." This trend of physical over mental is not new but it is really taking off. End of rant!

[graybach]

quote "IMHO, this thread has largely nothing to do with Baseball, Teaching, or Symphony Orchestras. The op just used those examples because they're three convenient figures that most of us could relate to and that data could be obtained for..."

Actually the op's question stemmed from a conversation with another musician concerning symphony orchestra concert attendance figures. It IS about the music, or at least society's preference of things that require very little from the user for our entertainment outlets. Hence we see the devaluation of activities that require mental effort. Perception rather than substance has become king. Our society as a whole has been trained by the media to believe that producing or listening to classical music is boring. Therefore "fun" stuff like athlectics, baseball is just an example, occupies the top revenue positions for said media. Pop music also shares the stage, but not so much classical anymore. I remember a often quoted line from American Bandstand in the 60's, " It's got a good beat. You can dance to it." This trend of physical over mental is not new but it is really taking off. End of rant!

I agree with most of that, because there is a "dumbing down" in America like never before, but at the same time, there are symphony orchestras, (Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic come to mind), who are having no attendance problems, and I believe it has to do with the fact that there is a blend of the older classics with quality newer music. It also doesn't hurt that Mr. Dudamel is a dynamic, fiery, younger conductor (he's 28) and that helps him connect with a younger audience. A lot of orchestras insist on playing the same music over and over, and yes, the pieces are classical, but there is never anything new. It goes stale. I think orchestras would have more success if they tended to do some kind of a blend and made some effort to connect with their potential audience (without dumbing down their product) and not wholly insist that the audience "take it or leave it."