To go off of Ian's comment, I find it very interesting... I'm at a federal museum in Quantico and I am not making NEARLY that much and likely never will. I am a GS-07, step 1, which is about halfway through the GS scale for federal employees. Not including locality pay, it's about $35,000 for me per year. The locality pay is what shoots my pay up to around $48,000, since we're so close to DC and in a very expensive area. My position is Exhibit Specialist and Preparator. My co-worker has her Masters in art history and did multiple internships with high class DC museums, and she started at a GS-05 for an exhibit specialist (which is only about $30,000 base rate!). For someone (at least from what I know from working here) to make even just $70,000 (with locality pay) would take years of going up that step ladder. From what I've gathered, you won't make much unless you're in a high ranking position or you've been in the federal government for years. At my old place, I started at only $16 an hour, and by the time I left (2 years later) I had been bumped up to $20, but knew for a fact that my male counterparts were making at LEAST 20% more than me. The 2 contracted mount makers we hired while I was there had pretty different pays too; one gave us a discount and charged us $50/hr (DC native), and the other charged only $30/hr (Louisiana native). Not only does it likely depend on your location, but it may also depend on your gender, your age, your background, and the local politics. I think as a general, mount makers are incredibly underpaid. This is a really interesting thread though, thank you for bringing it to our attention!