The Economics of Art Museums.

In December 1989, thirty-nine participants met in a conference to exchange views and information on four themes: (1) The Museum's Collection, (2) The Museum and the Public, (3) Museum Finances, and (4) The Museum and the Government. The conference was organized and hosted by the National Bureau of Economic Research. It was underwritten by the J. Paul Getty Foundation, the Mellon Foundation, the New York Times Foundation, and Mr. David Rockefeller. Participants had the advantage of six background papers each of which represented the results of substantial amounts of research on the subjects of finances, economic history of art museums, tax policy, government policy (2), and marketing. Five discussion sessions were held, one for each of the four topics mentioned above and a general overview of the economics of art museums. The intent is to share these experiences with all of us who did not attend.

Each of the five discussions was facilitated by semi-formal remarks by five prominent practitioners and researchers in the field of cultural economics. The ensuing discussions are included in the book. According to the editor, the two "cultures" (economists and museum administrators) were "successfully bridged" in the discussions.

This feeling appears to derive from the fact that a certain view of the economics of art museums was common to all participants. Art museums are considered to be much more important to a society, especially in the United States, than the level of funding indicates. In semi-technical terms, the marginal social benefit of art museums greatly exceeds its marginal social cost. The public, then, should be willing to surrender a larger share of its aggregate income to the management of these institutions. While the marginal cost of one museum experience is zero, the marginal cost of one museum activity is much greater than zero.

There are considerable differences between the advocates of various mechanisms by which this flow of funds should be accomplished. Three mechanisms are suggested. First, charges might be imposed on those who benefit from the services rendered by art museums. This is the "market" solution to the problem of funding museum activities. However, outside of commissary sales and store sales and a few travelling exhibitions, it is conceded that this mechanism will not produce an "adequate" level of funding.

Second, governments might contribute larger sums to support the budgets of museums at levels that are commensurate with the cultural significance of museum operations. Federal, state, and local governments could be involved in this funding mechanism. The opinion expressed most widely is that this is not the preferred solution to the problem of adequate funding.

Third, private philanthropy might provide a higher level of financial support if only (1) private donors were to become more conscious of the social significance of art museums and (2) if government would only restore some or all of the tax incentives to charitable contributions. Voluntarism is generally regarded by these participants as the best combination of adequacy and consistency with market mechanisms.

A review of this book is quite a daunting task. The resumes of the participants clearly indicate a level of qualifications that almost no one outside the group could match. The rest of us should gratefully accept the information and insights included in the book without much question. The essays, remarks, and discussions reported are non-technical in substance and are easily accessible to readers in a wide variety of orientation. Some familiarity with statistical procedures would be helpful in some instances. However, because the group of participants included those particular individuals, readers are expected to accord these remarks a degree of respect.

The "bridge" between the two "cultures" is much less apparent in the papers and the discussion than the editor suggests in the preface. It is very clear that the academic economists/researchers focus on transferring information concerning the economic circumstances that surround the operation of art museums. Administrators, trustees, and other museum officials are engrossed in persuading donors or patrons or attenders. Bridging this gap depends, in part, on whether the results of scholarship lend credibility to the persuasion. Bridging the gap also depends to some extent on the feelings shared by this group of researchers with this group of museum administrators.

Almost all books of this nature commonly suffer two types of shortfall when it comes to the education of the general public. There is a distressing level of redundancy as descriptions of mission and needs of art museums are repeated where there are only slight rhetorical variations from one contributor to another. The topics for the contributions to the conference were carefully planned and were selected because each represented a separate facet of a complex problem. However, each contribution was prepared without collaboration and the result is the lack of a developmental approach to the problems of funding art museums.

Even if a reader can get past the redundancy, there seems to be no progression from definition to resolution. It is full of significant expositions but it remains a collection of independent works on the central theme. For that reason, many of the very important and worthwhile contributions to the literature contained in the book may be lost to the reader. It is more likely to be useful as a reference piece by researchers who are doing background work on one of the aspects covered in this conference. One may open this book to a specific piece of work and find something very helpful. The bibliographies include a very large number of sources. A reading from front to back is not recommended.