2023-06-26 09:44:00
Fair pay initiatives have been campaigning intensively for fair remuneration in the art and culture sector for several years. The first successes have been recorded in the process initiated by the BMKÖS since 2020, but the road to really fair payment is still long and rocky. As Vice-President of the Austrian Music Council (ÖMR), the musicologist and music manager Eva-Maria Bauer was a driving and coordinating force in the middle of the action right from the start. Markus Deisenberger talked to her about the state of affairs and the grand vision of the project.
Let’s start by talking about the initial situation of the fair pay process. There is the much-cited Gallup survey on the fair pay gap in the arts and culture sector and the two studies on the social situation of artists and cultural mediators with shocking results. Could this be described as the starting point for the Fair Pay initiative that was launched?
Eva-Maria Bauer (c) Eva-Maria Bauer
Eva Maria Bauer: The Fair Pay process[i] came about because the implementation is formulated in the government agreement. The interest groups have lobbied intensively for this for twenty years – with success! Representatives from art and culture have been working closely with the public sector for three years now to declare war on the precariat in art and culture. The legal framework for this is formed, among other things, by the Fair Pay Strategy of the regional authorities (2022)[ii] The process is coordinated by Federal Ministry for Art and Arts, Public Service and Sportwhich is very committed to the topic.
The first step in the process was a survey of the fair pay gap among the federal funding recipients in order to clarify what additional financial needs we are actually talking about in the art and culture sector. At the federal level alone, the forecast financial requirement is €25 million, and in my opinion that is still far too low…
Salzburg is the great role model when it comes to fair pay.
And in the states?
Eva Maria Bauer: In Austria, culture is primarily a national matter. The federal states are at different stages of implementation and have different approaches. For example, the City of Vienna has significantly increased its budget for composition and project funding, created working grants for freelance artists and expanded the anchor centers to improve the infrastructure. The great role model when it comes to fair pay is and remains Salzburg. Salzburg is the first federal state in which all three regional authorities – federal, state and city – have taken on their responsibility and strategically implemented fair pay. With a phased plan, the fair pay gap for employed cultural workers is to be closed step by step by 2024. Now we are working together on a concept to achieve the same for the independent scene. And that is a far greater challenge!
Why?
Eva Maria Bauer: The field is very heterogeneous, and the actors are largely unorganized. After all, there is no list of freelance artists in Austria… So how do we reach this clientele? In the music division, we will initially concentrate on freelance ensembles. I think there is a particularly high backlog demand for fair pay there.
What does the term “fair pay” actually stand for? Fair fees, fair salaries or is it more?
Eva Maria Bauer: Clearly it is about fair payment, about the central question: “What is my music, my performance worth?” The interest groups have minimum fee recommendations[iii] published for all art genres and these in the “Fair Pay Reader”[iv] published. This is important in order to fill the term with life, so that fair pay does not just remain an empty phrase.
But it is also about fair working conditions: for example, fair compensation when events are canceled, or fair working hours and remuneration regulations in (music) theater operations. Fair pay is unthinkable without social security for artists and cultural workers. There are a lot of suggestions on the table as to how tax and social security law can be made fairer for freelance artists.[v]
The “Fairness Codex” developed in 2022[vi] interprets the term even further and calls for basic values such as respect, appreciation, sustainability, diversity and transparency. These are principles that are very important in funding practice and cultural policy work, but also in the scene. Especially when it comes to diversity, co-determination and fair pay, individuals and cultural organizations can also take measures themselves.
It’s about the central question: “What is my music, my performance worth?”
How do you achieve fair pay?
Eva Maria Bauer: Our central concern in the process: We want to anchor fair pay in all support systems. Many cultural institutions are publicly funded, so it makes sense to exert pressure through the public sector and demand regulations.
For example, think of how the live music section works… Organizers say: “We just don’t have enough money. How are we supposed to pay fair fees?” The artists say: “Then we’ll just play for less money. Better that than nothing.”
You want to say that musicians often have little room for negotiation when it comes to fees?
Eva Maria Bauer: Exactly. Therefore, we use the funding guidelines as a lever to establish a long-term awareness of fair payment in the scene. However, we not only have our sights on funded institutions, but also on large cultural tankers such as theaters and stages that are owned by the public sector. The fact that musicians only receive a fee of € 30 at a state event such as the 100-year celebration in Burgenland must not be repeated!
Doesn’t that also mean that the funding budgets have to be increased so that organizers and cultural institutions can pay fairly?
Eva Maria Bauer: Yes, of course money plays a big role. In the first year, the federal government provided €6.5 million for closing the fair pay gap, for 2023 €9 million will be distributed in federal project funding and annual funding. We at the Austrian Music Council, for example, have also benefited from this: for the first time in our existence, we have fair basic funding!
On the other hand, we must also bring about a cultural change in the music scene itself – away from wage dumping towards solidarity. Isn’t it better in the long term to offer one or the other event less and to pay more fairly for it overall…?
In 2023, the federal government will distribute €9 million in Fair Pay funds.
How has inflation affected you? If wages or fees are adjusted by a few percentage points, that sounds great at first. If it turns out afterwards that inflation eats away a large part of this wage increase, that’s no longer so great.
Eva Maria Bauer: In some cases, additional funds were made available to compensate for inflation. In the long term, however, it will not work without a valorisation of the culture budget. Otherwise inflation will eat up the distributed Fair Pay funds. There are institutions that have received the same amount of funding for ten years. How are they supposed to pay fairly?
However, with our call for automatic valorisation – i.e. the linking of funding contributions and culture budgets to the consumer price index or another index – we have so far been biting on granite when it comes to politics.
Isn’t it also the case that money is still not openly discussed? That’s exactly why many musicians don’t seem to know what a fair wage actually is. How do you create awareness for this?
Eva Maria Bauer: For that we need a different kind of musical education. When I put the word “market” in my mouth in conversation with musicians, many still wince. Numerous musicians who were actually aiming for employment find themselves in a highly competitive music market after completing their training and have to act like start-up entrepreneurs in order to assert themselves.
During the training, music students are drilled in artistic-technical and pedagogical skills. Music business and legal know-how, on the other hand, is still neglected. Two out of four public music universities in Austria do not even have a compulsory subject for this…
Talking about money is not “fancy”. Many musicians have to act like start-up entrepreneurs after their training in order to assert themselves on the music market…
What exactly is the future of Fair Pay? What are the next steps?
Eva Maria Bauer: Together with the state of Salzburg, we are developing a model of how fair pay is also accepted in the independent scene. Secondly, we have to politically ensure that the fair pay process is sustainable – i.e. financial resources are available for it in the years to come. In the non-funded area – church music, for example, in music tourism and at festivals and organizers that are not publicly subsidized – we have to sit down and negotiate with the protagonists separately.
And long term? How realistic is fair pay really in the music business?
Eva Maria Bauer: My future vision for the nationwide implementation of fair pay would be the founding of a chamber for freelance artists. In October 2022, the European Commission published guidelines for the first time on how collective agreements can be applied to the independent scene.[vii] That was a completely new thought for us! Imagine if there were binding minimum fees for freelance musicians and composers and clear regulations for reimbursement of expenses.
We have to be realistic – that doesn’t happen overnight. But I also see a huge opportunity in this: we now have the opportunity to really make a difference.
Thank you for the interview.
Markus Deisenberger
Eva Maria Bauer is a research associate at the Center for Applied Music Research at the University of Krems, music manager at Musikfabrik NÖ and Vice-President of the Austrian Music Council.
[i] Austrian Music Council: Fair Pay process at a glance and documents on Fair Pay
[ii]Regional authorities’ fair pay strategy for culture (2022)
[iii] mica – practical knowledge: “FAIR PAY – LIVING FROM MUSIC” – minimum fee recommendations for the music sector”
[iv] Kulturrat Österreich: “Fair Pay Reader” (ed. 2021)
[v] “Social insurance for artists in Austria” – position paper from May 24th, 2023 by the Austrian Council of Culture, umbrella organization of Austrian filmmakers, IG authors, IG free music creators, IG free theater work, initiative dance and movement art Austria, WORKING CONDITIONS – Working Group of Viennese perspective as well as by the trade union initiative vidaflex
[vi] Fairness Code. Art and culture in Austria (2022)
[vii] Guidelines on the application of Union competition law to collective agreements on working conditions for solo self-employed adopted in October 2022.
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