Labor organizer & advocate for pay equity in the arts
I am an advocate and organizer for pay equity and pay transparency. In 2020 I co-founded On Our Team, an organization that is dedicated to building pay equity and labor equity in the theatre industry in the USA.
Advocacy & Action
I created the Pay Equity Standards, a rubric and public symbol of equitable pay practices within arts non-profits, and the Theatrical Designer Pay Resource, a national database of crowdsourced compensation information for designers in the USA.
Explore the Pay Equity Standards, Pay Resource, and other resources.
Tools & Resources
I have spoken at conferences, with university classes, on podcasts, and panel discussions about my work and the industry.
Appearances
My writing on pay equity, transparency, and labor equity has helped transform the global conversation around artistic labor and compensation in the theatre industry and inspired systemic change. The essays have activated individuals to make changes within their own companies and organize for collective action.
Writing
Working with arts organizations to build pay equity policies
Pay equity is a necessary component of an organization’s diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility practice.
My consulting process works with arts organizations to audit pay equity within their company, create pay equity policies, and build accountability and pay transparency.
BLVE Consults uses my process to build sustainable pay equity within arts organizations.
I am an organizer on pay and labor equity in the arts. I worked for over 15 years as a freelance artist and arts non-profit administrator, including as director of development for Collaboraction Theatre Company and my current role as associate director of programs at Lawyers for the Creative Arts, a legal service organization.
These experiences as an arts worker deeply inform my work as an arts advocate. My essays on labor and pay equity have inspired systemic change in the theatre industry, and the tools I’ve created including the Pay Equity Standards, and the Theatrical Designer Pay Resource have been used nation-wide by individuals and organizations to promote pay transparency and pay equity. I am a co-founder of On Our Team, and in 2021, I was honored to receive the Michael Merritt Arts Advocacy Award.
About me…
Contact
Want to connect? Send me a message:
Email
info@elsahiltner.com
Photos by zakkiyyah najeebah dumas-o’neal and Joel Maisonet.