Labor negotiations are typically marked by revolutionary rhetoric followed by incremental gains. For all the pre-game talk about rewriting the economic order, the end result typically looks like three yards and a cloud of dust.
The Writers Guild of America argues that its current negotiation is different, and that it must result in a dramatic overhaul of writer compensation.
Central to that case is the claim that writer pay is declining.
But is it?
The guild has cited internal survey data showing that TV writer-producer weekly pay has dropped 4% (or 23% adjusted for inflation) since 2013.
That claim is subject to some scrutiny.
The guild does not release its full surveys, just a handful of statistics. But taking those at face value, all of the decline occurred between 2013 and 2015.
Since then, median weekly pay is up in nominal terms, and is even up slightly when adjusted for inflation.
The guild began doing surveys with the 2013-14 TV season. But for decades before that, the WGA has been measuring film and TV writer pay based on dues collections, and releasing detailed data tables in its annual reports.
Those figures tell a fairly simple story.
Since 1995, the average writer is doing about the same.
Average writer earnings in 1995, adjusted to 2021 dollars: $261,000.
Average writer earnings in 2021: $260,000.
Average earnings do not account for the sizable number of WGA members who, in any given year, earn nothing from writing. The WGA has not released a median annual figure since 2014, when it was $140,000 (in 2021 dollars, for the sake of consistency).
The data also doesn’t factor income from producing, which can lead to much higher paydays.
But looking at the data that is available, the collective stability is notable, given the instability of individual careers and the tectonic shifts that have occurred in the industry over that period.
A generation ago, film writers earned far more than TV writers, on average. But film pay has steadily deteriorated, along with a decline in the number of films released. TV writers’ pay has risen significantly, even accounting for inflation, over the last decade of “Peak TV.”
Now the average TV writer makes more than the average film writer.
Median pay is lower — in film, it’s far lower — but the trend is the same: film down, TV up.
In 2001, median pay in film and TV was roughly the same: $108,000 in TV, $105,000 in film. By 2014, the last year available, median TV writer earnings had grown to $138,000, while median film writer pay had dropped to $77,000 (all in 2021 dollars).
Meanwhile, the number TV writers has increased dramatically, while the number of film writers has remained almost flat. (Some writers work in both mediums, so the total number of working writers is less than the sum of TV and film writers.)
Total spending on all writers has exploded by 50%, from $1 billion in 1995 to $1.5 billion in 2021. It peaked as high as $1.8 billion in 2019, just before the pandemic. (All in 2021 dollars.)
It’s just that, at the same time, the total number of writers also increased by 50%, leaving the average writer in the exact same position as a generation earlier.
The latest annual report was issued last year, and provides data through 2021. It’s not yet known if writer employment and earnings have rebounded from the pandemic. Given the general belt-tightening underway at some studios, it’s possible the 2019 peak may not be seen again for some time.
Because it ends in 2021, the annual report data also does not fully account for the spike in inflation over the last two years, which has led to an erosion of the buying power of guild minimums.
For many years, the guild presented its data as the definitive source on writer pay. But in 2007, a few months before writers went on strike, a caveat made its way into the annual report.
The TV writer-producer figures “do not fully reflect the above-scale amounts paid,” the report stated, before going on to note that above-scale pay had been “under significant pressure,” and that therefore total pay “may have declined in recent years.”
“Downward pressure on overscale pay” has since become a recurring theme. It was mentioned again in the 2017 report. It was cited in 2019 during the WGA’s fight with talent agencies. It’s been cited in 2023 as well.
The evidence for it comes from the member surveys, which show that such downward pressure may have occurred between 2013 and 2015. A WGA spokesman declined to release any further survey data, noting that there is no obligation to do so.
Read More About:
Source: Read Full Article
