Obviously the coffee shop manager makes more than the curator

What strikes us as a strange complaint:

Tate Britain has defended advertising for a head of coffee with a salary of nearly £40,000 – more than the average wage of a London-based curator – after critics said the role highlights how low museum professionals’ wages are.

The wage comparison site Glassdoor states that the average annual wage for a curator based in London is £37,300. The Prospect union said the pay discrepancy was a reminder of how badly paid museum professionals are in comparison with other jobs in the arts sector.

Alan Leighton, Prospect’s national secretary, told the Guardian that heritage-specific roles were paid “appallingly”, despite the fact that without qualified specialist workers there would be no galleries or museums. “It’s time that was recognised and those roles rewarded accordingly,” he said.

As we have pointed out before all jobs pay the same. Not wholly and entirely of course, but the desirability of a job in its non-cash elements will reduce the cash on offer, the undesirability of a job in its non-cash increase.

There are far more fine arts graduates than there jobs as museum curators, there are many, many, people who would love that job of scholarship and showing the tourists around than there are opportunities to do so. Therefore the cash compensation is not all that high.

True, we do have to put aside the usual jokes about all arts graduates competing for those jobs as baristas in this case. But there are fewer people who actually desire a lifetime staring into coffee cups than those lusting after one examining and curating the glories of the past. Pay is therefore lower.

More modern scholarship might call this the compensating theory of wage differentials, or perhaps the hedonic theory of wages. Whatever we call it though it is true - jobs that are inherently fun and desirable pay less money than those less so.

Given how well established - even, given the ancient nature of this wisdom - this point is we’re a little surprised that these conservators of the past don’t already know this.