In an attempt to balance its budget amidst declining endowments, the world-renowned Cleveland Museum of Art laid off 14 employees on Tuesday. The museum has a staff of about 300, and in addition to the layoffs they will leave 8 vacant positions unfilled.

Timothy Rub, director of the museum, indicated that these moves will help to balance the museum's budget in its current fiscal year as well as the one beginning in July 2010.

In the past two years, the museum's endowment has dropped from $821 million to about $510 million.

Rub will also be leaving the museum in September to take a new job at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.