Re: Re: Re: Florida Philharmonic Orchestra Strike


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Posted by economics? on October 21, 2000 at 22:18:11:

In Reply to: Re: Re: Florida Philharmonic Orchestra Strike posted by Economist on October 21, 2000 at 20:08:04:

The actions of the union have created an artificially high market demand for musicians, a situation to which the individual aspiring musician reacts in a predictable, and rational fashion: he/she enters the field because of the positive economic profits available. The union prevents the market demand for orchestral musicians from receding, yet it does not create enough new positions to be filled by all the new musicians, a process through which economic profits for the individual musician would be exhausted. I can't build an economic model on the fly, especially with no statiscal input, but it is fairly obvious that the union has created the situation wherein there is a larger aggregate quantity of musicians willing to supply their services at the market price than the quantity demanded of such. We did not create the supply, the success of the union did. In this regard and with all due respect, Alex C is more correct than you. Jay won his job against quality competition. The orchestral audition process is effective at properly allocating the available positions, much more so than professional athletics, where you can get in on promise alone. You don't win the job with a major symphony because they think you'll be good in a few years.

The public is perfectly willing to support orchestras. Why? Because there are two markets that create demand high-quality orchestras: the market for quality live music of that kind, and the market for demonstrable affluence/philanthropy. The simple fact is that quality orchestras create a positive externality in the communities in which they perform. That we reap the social benefits of this by pseudo-Pigovian subsidies is lamentable, and I predict that the communities where there are people not looking for tax deductions so much as they are looking for a way to demonstrate their affluence/philanthropy,(by letting the community gain the social benefits of the externality through some more Coasian arrangement), will have more successful orchestras. Only through such a Coasian arrangement will the situation that the union created be allowed to continue indefinitely, ceteris paribus, or, more realistically, until tax laws, the public's tastes in music, or the wealthy's preference for how best to display their affluence changes.

Best wishes to the members of the FPO in resolving this matter favorably.


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