[CAUT] CAUT pay, was Job Opening...

[Jeff Tanner]

On Oct 11, 2007, at 2:19 PM, Ed Sutton wrote:

> There is more.  As long as administrators are so ignorant of the  
> maintenance needs of pianos that they think a custodian with a  
> tuning hammer and an accutuner can do the job, they'll continue to  
> hire people who are glad to work for custodial pay.
>
> It's gonna take a while....
>
> Ed Sutton


It also goes back to Doctored Musicians in tenure-track positions  
that pay peanuts.  Those folks think we shouldn't be paid as much as  
them.  It is a very big mountain to move, and I don't think any PTG  
endorsement or continued education will ever be seen as equal to a  
doctorate from a university.  We will always be seen as beneath them.

Further, Human Resources classification departments just don't have  
an accurate classification for us, and the systems most states, if  
they haven't already, are switching to use job "families" to classify  
employees.  What that generally means for us is that they've got to  
group us with somebody we don't match with.  For other occupations,  
that's great.  But we don't match anything in any state  
classification I've seen.  And there is good reason for that.  We  
have one, ONE piano technician on the payroll of the state of South  
Carolina.  Why bother?

But I will have to side a bit with the administrators on what is real  
world vs ideal.  You give me a good coachable beginner or novice  
tuner, ideally someone who has at least taken the Potter course, and  
I'll give him a VTD and put him in practice rooms.  In a short time,  
I can teach him (or her, of course, as long as the wife doesn't get  
jealous) enough to have him making a big difference to the inventory  
I can't get to.  There isn't a much better piano technician training  
ground than to be an assistant CAUT.  That doesn't mean I think the  
pay should be so low.  Tuning spinets and old uprights pays better if  
you're willing to take that kind of work on.  That's a training  
ground too.

My dad worked for 37 years as a lineman for the power company.  He  
didn't have to be trained before he could be hired.  They had then,  
and still have, a two year apprenticeship program to journeyman  
lineman.  And that apprenticeship program today pays as well as some  
head CAUT positions with better benefits than state benefits, and  
when you have to work past 4:30, you're paid time and a half -- not  
comp time.

This work isn't rocket science, folks.  But it is a very unique skill  
combination.  It is also a very rare occupation.  That's what they  
should be paying for -- supply and demand, and the value of the  
alternative -- the private sector market.  We gotta keep in mind 99+%  
of us are not F/T CAUTs.  Where else is a music professor going to  
work as a music professor, though?  Degreed musicians are a dime a  
dozen -- at any given time we have some 450 students studying music  
here at USC Columbia alone.  How many are studying piano tuning in  
all of the state?  That is what should drive up the salaries --  
supply and demand.  A good rebuilder and concert technician, yes, is  
ideal.  But the real truth of the matter is that even somebody who  
can do good solid tuning and general repair would be of great value  
to most universities, and that is still an extremely rare find  
compared to the other folks working in these departments.  We have  
such people making very good money in the private sector, where the  
work isn't nearly as necessary.


Jeff Tanner, RPT
University of South Carolina



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