Why the Musicians will lose the Orchestral Lockout

For those of you that live in Minnesota, you may be aware of the Minnesota Orchestral Association’s decision to lock out the Minnesota Orchestra Musicians and cancel concerts. If you do not live in Minnesota, or if you didn’t know the lockout was going on, here is what you need to know:

1)  The Orchestral Association offered the musicians a salary cut of 20-50% (depending on the source) in an effort to cut labor costs by $5 million/year

2) The Minnesota Orchestra Musicians refused this offer, instead offering to continue negotiating while performing the rest of the season

3) The Association refused this offer, locked out the musicians from playing, and cancelled the 2012-2013 season.  

With that out of the way, here are three reasons this lockout isn’t going to end in the Musicians’ favor.

 

3) The salary numbers are on the Association’s side

Numbers are funny. People tend to trust numbers and statistics as impervious to manipulation or deceit. In reality numbers are incredibly easy to manipulate simply by changing the terms, moving the origin point of a graph, or claiming causation when there isn’t any. It is typically only by examining all of the data in its raw form that someone can hope to make any sort of objective conclusion regarding the issue at hand. But rather than do that let's just look at the numbers both sides are throwing around regarding the Musicians’ salaries and figure out which side makes the better case. Is this a fair way to judge the issue? No, and yes. It isn’t a fair way to determine who is right, often a subjective issue anyway, but it is certainly a fair way to see who is using numbers to more effectively win, or lose, public support.

The salary number the Musicians use is the 30-50% cut they would be required to take under the associations offer. A 30-50% salary cut is not an insignificant loss of income, regardless of how much a person is making. The decision to use a range allows the musicians to use the shock value of the high-end number while not opening themselves up to the stigma of lying if the real salary cut request is shown to be at the low end. It’s an effective argument because it allows some manipulation of the truth without committing to any facts that could be proven false. Any salaried employee can appreciate the impact a 30% cut to their paycheck would have on them and their family. So, the argument effectively uses and manipulates the data, while immediately providing the public with something that resonates with their own lives. This is a very effective strategy, one that would firmly sway public opinion to the Musicians’ side if the Association didn’t have a slightly better number to throw back.

The Orchestral Association uses $89,000 as the proposed average salary the Musicians would receive under the new contract. Rather than debating the actually percentage cut requested, the Association has just decided to depict the Musicians as greedy through making public the salary offer they rejected. Even if the musicians have been asked to take a 50% salary cut, most people will only be able to see the $89,000 the Musicians would be making instead of seeing the $89,000 they would be losing. This salary number is a more effective argument because it puts the emphasis on what has been offered instead of what will be taken away. Furthermore, the $89,000 is just a tick over the $42,847 per capita income that Minnesotans enjoy. The Musicians turned down double the average Minnesotans salary, and that is the way the average Minnesotan will view it. Because the general public makes well under the amount offered, the general public will dismiss the Musicians requests as ungrateful or greedy. The Association hasn’t necessarily won public support, but they have made sure the Musicians lost it.  

2) People don’t care about classical music

This may be a bit of an overgeneralization, since clearly some people do care about classical music, but nobody cares about classical music. I like classical music more than most of my friends - which means that in addition to the names Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart, I also know the name Gustav Holst - but the number of classical music concerts I have willingly attended in my life is still right around that 0 number. This isn’t to say that classical music isn’t important, just that it isn’t important to people who might live to see the year 2050.  The majority of classical music concerts are attended by people who are very old, or very forced to attend a school field trip. I am willing to wager my meager savings that the best attended orchestra concerts have featured one of the names I mentioned above, John Williams, or Christmas as the theme.

One of the issues the Musicians had with the Association’s offer was that it would incorporate more Pops performances into their schedule. The Musicians don’t want to play more Pops because Pops tend to be rather unchallenging, and you can only play the Jaws theme so many times before you begin envying Quint’s fate. The Musicians may be right about Pops music being unchallenging, and lacking the emotional resonance of Brahms, but if Pops shows attract larger crowds then they need to play more Pops. The reality of the situation is that the Association’s demands are influenced by the market, while the Musicians demands are influenced by a love for music. Because the issue is almost entirely monetary, the side that is basing its decisions on the financial reality of the situation is the side that is in a stronger bargaining position. The Musicians assume that the people of Minnesota love classical music as much as they do; but as reality begins to prove otherwise, the Associations position will only strengthen. The general indifference to classical music makes it impossible for the Musicians to hold on to their ideals, while recent history supports the Associations demands for changes.

1) People don’t care about the lockout

This actually ties in directly with the second point. People don’t care about classical music, and as such they don’t care about a classical music strike. Most Minnesotans are surprised to realize the lockout is still in effect, because it has such an insignificant impact on their daily lives. This isn’t exactly a teacher’s strike - where people’s daily lives are actually inconvenienced and they are forced to experience the ramifications of failed negotiations - this is not having the opportunity to attend a concert you weren’t going to attend anyway. Because the government isn’t directly involved in the issue, people can’t even get riled up about the politics of it all. In the distance between yard signs supporting the musicians, most people completely forget the lockout is even going on. The only reason I even wrote this post was because I was shocked to learn that the lockout was still in effect.

The perceived insignificance of the lockout plays right into the Associations hand. The Musicians arguments rely on mass public support, as is often the case in disputes between employees and employers, but they don’t really have it. The Musicians have some public support, but it is hardly enough to keep moral high when the other side is prepared to play the waiting game. The longer the lockout goes on, the less people will care about it, and the more desperate the Musicians will be to just start playing at Orchestra Hall again.

There you have it. Three reasons this lockout isn’t going to end in the Musicians’ favor.  Sound off in the comments below.