Posts tagged Baltimore Museum of Art
Unionization Wave Hits Nonprofit Sector
December 17, 2025 // ASeveral key economic factors are driving this current union organizing trend, including inflation and job security. In this environment, employees are motivated to seek the protections that higher pay and increased benefits offer. However, about one-third of nonprofit museums and cultural institutions are also struggling to confront the loss of government grants or contracts. More than half of museums reported fewer 2025 visitors than in 2019, according to a Novemberreport by the American Alliance of Museums. In spite of these conflicting economic difficulties, employees are continuing to push back, feeling that they have been taken for granted for many years. Bottom line: unions continue to seek out new groups of workers to organize as their traditional targets, such as manufacturing and production jobs, wane or move overseas. Nonprofit employers would be well advised to stay engaged with their employees, keep an eye on employee morale, and look for ways to reward employees' hard work even when funds are scarce.
LACMA Employees Push to Unionize, Calling for ‘Fairer Compensation’ and ‘Expanded Benefits’
October 30, 2025 // The AFSCME Cultural Workers United District Council 36 has aided in the unionization efforts at other LA museums, including the Museum of Contemporary Art, the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures and Foundation, and the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County and La Brea Tar Pits. The larger AFSCME Cultural Workers United represents employees at museums like the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Philadelphia Art Museum, the Denver Art Museum, the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the Frost Art Museum in Miami, the Brooklyn Museum, the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., and the Harvard Art Museums in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Baltimore Museum of Industry’s new exhibit looks at modern labor movement
June 7, 2024 // A new exhibit examines calls for changes in the workforce that drove workers in non-trade jobs to create collective bargaining agreements across the country. The "Collective Action: Labor Activism in 20th Century Baltimore" exhibit at the Baltimore Museum of Industry, is about workers rallying for unions, and it dives into who wants change and why. Advertisement Workers in several industries are banding together and calling for better pay and conditions. The exhibit reveals professions some may be surprised to learn were involved in the efforts.
Baltimore Museum Employees Unionize Amid National Labor Movement at Art Institutions
July 19, 2022 // Workers at the Baltimore Museum of Art announced plans to form a union last October. Among the changes the union sought were fairer wages, better job security, and input in museum policies that directly affected them, according to the union’s website. Many workers said they were inspired to embrace unionization in the wake of the pandemic, when front of house staff — who faced the greatest risk of contracting the virus — had little say in safety protocols and daily decision-making. BMA did not layoff or furlough employees during the pandemic, but mass layoffs at museums nationwide illustrated the preciousness of employment in the industry. Chris Bedford, Christine Dietze, Asma Naeem, New Museum and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, and the Philadelphia Museum, as well as the MFA Boston and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, all formed unions. The Whitney Museum was among a small group of institutions to have seen their unions voluntarily and swiftly recognized by their leadership — the decision came just two weeks after employees filed a petition to join the Technical, Office, and Professional Union of Local 2110. (MOCA also voluntarily recognized its union).