29th December 2007, 10:39 PM
My gut feeling is....no. No easy answer, certainly. The heritage sector is operated on such a different basis and scale (No EH, state-regulated archaeology rather than federal, far more pronounced regionalization due to vast scale of country) that it would be severely difficult to enact any sort of nationwide change. That said, it's not right or fair that things are as they are, and if you can play any part in bringing about change for the better, kudos! I know we're all grateful to be working in greatly improved conditions because of what BAJR has accomplished.
There is certainly merit in your suggestion to archaeologyfieldwork.com in implementing a similar sort of minimum pay threshold for ads. It all comes down to solidarity in the end, which is the problem when there are so many variables and parties concerned. I feel Jennifer may have missed the point of banding together against low pay in her "let the digger decide" approach. There will always be people desperate enough to take lower pay, which is neither good for them nor their colleagues.
There is certainly merit in your suggestion to archaeologyfieldwork.com in implementing a similar sort of minimum pay threshold for ads. It all comes down to solidarity in the end, which is the problem when there are so many variables and parties concerned. I feel Jennifer may have missed the point of banding together against low pay in her "let the digger decide" approach. There will always be people desperate enough to take lower pay, which is neither good for them nor their colleagues.