The Challenges of Unionizing Animation

Bojack Horseman has been a successful animated comedy for years. Also for years, the California crew making it has been non-union, even though ...:

... Artists working on Bojack have wanted to unionize since the show’s first season was in production, but back then their intentions were discouraged by their employers. At the same time, Michael Eisner’s The Tornante Company, which owns the show, employed writers and voice-over talent who have been unionized from the beginning through WGA and SAG-AFTRA, the respective unions covering those crafts. This has caused friction for the Bojack crew, which believes that there is a tier system of unionization that values some of the talent more than others. ...

Rule of thumb: the more leverage, the more results. (SAG-AFTRA often has traction, the WGA less so, the Animation Guild often-times less than that. But sometimes the dynamics are different. I've known instances where TAG got a contract with a new cartoon studio and other unions didn't.)

Another rule of thumb: when non-union employees are paid well and get good benefits, they are more reluctant to rock the corporate boat and unionize. However, this happens but seldom. From most a company's perspective, why the hell be non-union if you don't low-ball pay and skimp on benefits? Might as well sign a union contract.

Happily, in recent years many animation employees have gotten more militant about working under a union contract. They're aware that every week they don't get union benefits, they damage their future pension earnings and make it harder to quickly return to union health coverage. (When a group of employees makes less than most others in the same business and know it, a union organizer's job is already half done: "An abusive non-union employer is the best unon organizer there is.")

The reality of the L.A. animation business in 2019? Entertainment conglomerates and Amazon and Netflix pay for production work and the produced shows that people watch. Small studios in Los Angeles and abroad do the front-to-back production, and often have incentives to keep employees' pay low, but the bill -- ultimately -- is footed by giant businesses with deep pockets. So there is no reason any artist, writer or tech director should be paid less than her unionized peers.