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thenomadwhosteppedup t1_jadoh42 wrote

If you're relocating with your partner presumably you'd be living together and splitting the cost of a one-bedroom? In that case a salary of $50K is perfectly liveable in Boston. However, I would honestly be surprised if someone in your field with your number of years of experience is actually making $50K - I would budget lower and expect to earn a pretax salary of around $42K. I've worked in the museum/art nonprofit sector for 10 years and make under $70K. I'm sure this isn't anything you haven't heard before, but the field you're in is very competitive; there are relatively many jobs in those fields in Boston, but there are also a ton of well-qualified graduates coming out of all the schools here. What kind of work experience did you have in college? If it was something like a work-study job or similar admin/entry-level experience that won't make you stand out at all in job applications or allow you to negotiate for a higher salary. If you did have a higher level of responsibility that would allow you to apply for more mid-level jobs then you could maybe earn around $60K, depending on the organization and exact industry. Also, I know you just listed two arbitrary examples, but assistant curator and PR assistant are two extremely different jobs with extremely different levels of responsibility and experience required - it's basically unheard of these days to become a museum assistant curator without a PhD (except at maybe very small/regional museums, which in turn are not going to be able to offer a high salary). I'm not saying any of this to scare you off of moving here - you can definitely earn a perfectly liveable salary here working in the area you want to work in, although you would also need to rely on cost-saving measures like splitting costs with your partner, living with roommates, whatever, to make it doable. I do however think you should realistically adjust your salary expectations downwards even from $50K.

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PassionPit101 OP t1_jady5fo wrote

Thanks so much for your insight! My partner would be going back to college shortly after we move so I would have more credentials than him, but either way he would split costs with me using financial aid from school or working an entry-level job. In any case I would probably be contributing a bit more in the meantime while we make the transition---do you think $50k would be doable if the other person is making around $30k? Anticipating the worst-case scenario. I mentioned $50k because that's just under the starting salary I've recently seen for those holding only a BA at places like the MFA which are well-endowed, but naturally it makes sense that smaller nonprofit museums would have less to offer salary-wise.

I'm doing two part-time jobs---one working in a rare book and manuscript library where I'm getting some professional development experience with conservation and curation as well as working with researchers---"the kind of thing many people do for summer internships but instead year-round", according to what my boss has told me anyway. I've been doing that for 3 years. The other is working as a historical manuscript transcriptionist/paleographer for a local cemetery's digitization project, which I've been doing for 2 years. I almost secured an internship at an art museum before the pandemic happened and they were forced to close, and I'd be trying for that again after graduation if no other opportunities materialize in order to boost my resume.

Definitely heard curatorial assistant take a lot more credentials---meant that as more of a placeholder for museum/library jobs in general like collections, archives, museum education etc. (I should probably go edit that!) As for PR that's because my Media Production/Communication degree would technically qualify me to do that as well content creation. Definitely a totally different path from History or Classics but I wanted those hard skills to offer to the museum space or even if I needed to pivot to a totally different industry.

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[deleted] t1_jadzd0e wrote

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PassionPit101 OP t1_jae2llm wrote

I see your point! I think I'm kind of an exception in terms of what I find fun though haha---I'm from rural Appalachia so I can't lie, I'm pretty easily entertained just taking advantage of the free things the city has to offer like parks and museums! Plus neither my partner or I are the drinking/partying type. We're more than happy to save a little bit over time to do fun things on occasion.

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thenomadwhosteppedup t1_jae0z3i wrote

Yes okay that makes sense! I would say a combined salary of $80K is doable (tight but doable). It sounds like your experience would qualify you for jobs in university libraries, archives, special collections, etc. which there are definitely a lot of in the Boston area (more than there are in other areas of the arts and nonprofit sector). Those jobs also tend to pay relatively well in my experience too, like $50-60K although it depends on the university, exact responsibilities, blah blah. But I think you guys should be fine! Good luck!

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