Most of us in the arts have probably heard the argument espoused by others that we shouldn’t care if we get paid a lot because we are doing what we love and apparently having fun.
After reading a recent article in the Atlantic, I started to wonder if businesses were trying to use the same psychology on a broader scale to keep employee pay low.
In one section, of the article, writer Bourree Lam interviews author Miya Tokumitsu who suggests employers are trying to monetize employee enjoyment. Essentially making customers feel good about the employees feeling good.
Tokumitsu: When I found that Craigslist posting [for cleaners who were passionate], I was super depressed. You’re demanding that this person—who is going to do really hard physical work for not a lot of money—do extra work. On top of having to scrub the floors and wash windows, they have to show that they’re passionate too? It’s absurd and it’s become so internalized that people don’t even think about it. People write these job ads, and of course they’re going to say they want a passionate worker. But they don’t even think about what that means and that maybe not everyone is passionate.
Later they mention McDonald’s recent Pay With Love effort to have employees and customers trade smiles, high-fives, hugs, dance, etc.
They say there is something of a subtext to all this that if you are theoretically passionate about your work, you shouldn’t be complaining to the boss.
As a contrast they offer the dynamic in Japan where your entire identity isn’t necessarily closely tied the job you do.
Tokumitsu: Japanese work culture is ridiculed in the U.S., [for example] the caricature of the soulless Japanese salary man. It’s not the answer to emulate any one country, but I feel like in Japan there’s a lot more respect for service workers: You do your job, and serve the public, and then you retreat to the private world. I also think there’s a sense of purpose in work that’s not based on achieving yellow smiley-face happiness. There’s a certain satisfaction to be taken from performing a certain role in society, whether you’re driving a taxi or working at a convenience store. “I’m doing something that other people are relying on,”—and that’s such a different way to regard work.
So should arts people bitch and moan a lot more about their jobs to emphasize just how much work it is?
To be honest, even without this article in the Atlantic, some sort of effort that underscored how much work went into the creation of a work was probably necessary. Some form of the “why do you want money, you are having fun,” sentiment has served as a common thread in recent orchestra contract negotiations.
But artists publicly grousing about how awful their jobs are isn’t really constructive for the arts sector.
Well, unless you are The Smiths…
Most people in the arts are genuinely pleased to do what they do. Regardless of whether they get paid a lot or not, they experience a high degree of emotional satisfaction while performing their jobs. There is little to be gained by telling them to pretend to be more miserable.
The fact they experience this emotional satisfaction is one reason people in the arts will accept lower pay than they should. But they are also increasingly realizing that the existence of emotional satisfaction should have no bearing on their financial remuneration.
You generate your own damn feeling of satisfaction, not your employer. They don’t own it and it isn’t any of their business. They aren’t giving you an opportunity to feel emotionally satisfied by working for them. It comes independently of their involvement.
Being emotionally satisfied and being financially satisfied are two separate things and arts people need to recognize that and not confuse them.
All this being said, it still comes back to the issue that some sort of awareness raising effort is probably going to be required over time to combat the perception that it is all fun and no blisters and sacrifices.
I am not sure what the most constructive manifestations of that might be.
Great post, Joe!
Are you familiar with the overjustification effect? Its the mental confusion that sometimes results from getting paid to do what we already like doing. When you suggest that we keep our feelings of emotional and financial satisfaction separate you have stated the crux of the difficulty for many folks. There has been some fascinating research on this and its well worth a read. Much of it is summarized here:
http://youarenotsosmart.com/2011/12/14/the-overjustification-effect/
One of the things that seems to affect artists is that we are sometimes getting paid for what we enjoy, but that the things we are doing for that pay are often so personal and so intimate that it is a real struggle to make sense of receiving money for it. Anything can be made entrepreneurial. For instance, even the stuff that normal people do in the privacy of their bedrooms has become such a huge industry that generates many more times the income of most arts practices (I am guessing, but the comparison is worth framing this in regardless).
I know that there are folks who in their ordinary lives have no confusion that the kisses and embraces they share need to have some emotional investment or attachment. One night stands, hooking up with random strangers, and even selling your self to strangers happens often enough that it can be seen as normal human psychology. And yet not everyone would feel comfortable selling their kisses to strangers. Not everyone would successfully navigate the entrepreneurial path for this activity that they are happy to give away for free to the people they love. And that too is normal human psychology.
And the difference between the two says something very important for folks in the arts who are forced into being professional with activities they feel to be personal and intimate expressions of themselves. The truth is that the way we feel about our art activities is sometimes a thing for which financial satisfaction not only makes very little sense but is offensive. Imagine you had just made love to your partner, a person you have known for years and with whom you have a personal longstanding relationship, and at the end of your love making that person hands you a wad of cash. How would that make you feel? Getting money for doing the thing we love is sometimes like that, for many artists I know. They would rather give it away for free to people who they know would enjoy it than depend on selling it for their income.
Many artists I know would still make art if they won the lottery, but without the financial pressure of needing to make a living they would rather give it away. What would you do with your art making if you suddenly became fabulously wealthy? If your reputation was more important than the art itself it might make sense to continue selling it, but if making the art was what you lived for, would selling it even be a priority?
One last thought for why emotional satisfaction and financial satisfaction don’t always see eye to eye: Take doing something you are morally opposed to as the example, the opposite side of loving what you do being finding it inexcusable. Now if emotional and financial satisfaction were truly separable it would make sense to also say that vegetarians would (should) have no problems working in slaughterhouses and prudes would (should) have no issue starring in porn films. If we can separate these feelings, then yes, we should be able to earn a living doing these things.
But the trouble is that jobs are not merely how we get paid, they are an extension of our selves. Jobs are part of our self definition, our identity, and its not always easy to compartmentalize these parts of who we are. That seems the larger issue. Its a question of what matters to the individual as a whole versus what happens to specific parts of that person, and whether accommodating conflicting demands requires us to be schizophrenic in some sense or whether it can be reconciled within the larger picture.
One other way to look at it would be as means and ends. For most artists I know making art is an end in itself, and not often thought of primarily as the means to financial security. If art has the value of an end in itself it is not justified by its means of accomplishment. And if the financial part of making art is a means for continuing to make art but not an end in itself, it IS justified differently than the art itself. Or if making money IS an end, but a different one than making art is, we can’t simply assume that they are equal at the table. We can have conflicting priorities, and choosing between them is not always something we are prepared to do. The rules for how to choose are something each of us has to answer themselves….. That’s why this seems so complicated to so many folks.
These are important issues for the arts. Professionals in the arts are far more nuanced than homoeconimus would have us think. Behavioral economics and psychology paint a much more sophisticated picture, but the puzzle itself is not something we have clearly identified yet. Its good we are talking about it though 🙂
Carter-
When I was writing the piece, I was thinking back to a series I wrote on the book Human Sigma which deals with behavioral economics in relation to customer service. Series starts here- http://www.insidethearts.com/buttsintheseats/2009/11/16/emotional-satisfaction/
I got interested in the book due to a comment made that arts managers weren’t sharpening their skills because they felt emotionally satisfied with their jobs. I am not sure that is as true today given the proliferation of arts related blogs and related conversations since then.
Case in point – Any emotional satisfaction you feel with your work certainly hasn’t pacified you! You do a great deal of thinking about these subjects and their implications.