Michael LeRoy is an expert in labor law and labor relations at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. LeRoy, who advised the Council of Economic Advisors for President George W. Bush during the last national emergency labor dispute in October 2001, spoke with News Bureau business and law editor Phil Ciciora about the writers’ and actors’ strikes that have upended the entertainment industry.
The 2008 Writers Guild of America strike ended after three months. How long do you foresee the current WGA strike lasting, which is already in its second month?
I think this strike will last much longer than three months. In 1988, the writers were on strike for nearly 22 weeks – and this time, they are striking over job-killing issues, such as the use of artificial intelligence in generating creative works. So I could easily see the current labor stoppage stretching well past the 22-week mark.
How is their current strike different from or similar to previous Hollywood labor imbroglios?
Similar to the 2008 strike, the WGA is fighting for shared control over the digital distribution of their work. Since 2008, online producers of media content have proliferated, and this has eroded the WGA’s core membership, who traditionally mostly worked for traditional platforms.
In 2008, the writers won the right to represent many online writers, but those gains have vanished as employers found new workarounds to hire freelance writers. The union is once again trying to ensure that scripts and other written content is paid by the terms of their contract.
The Screen Actors Guild has joined the WGA on the picket line. Does this illustrate how disruptive both writers and actors view technological advances such as artificial intelligence and streaming technology, and the attendant effects on their work conditions and pay?
Definitely. Both strikes are driven by the unions’ existential concerns that human creativity can be machine-learned and replicated by AI, so that their work can take on its own creative force. An example would be a writer who starts a script and an algorithm that finishes it and learns to write a better one – or a cheaper one to produce. Another example would be an actor whose likeness is used in perpetuity without additional compensation.
The other technological facet is the growing dominance of streaming, where Netflix, Amazon, Apple and others have vertically integrated production of high-quality entertainment and use their global online reach to stream it.
These newcomers to entertainment are upending the cinematic experience as well as the television rerun distribution system, all of which were under the unions’ ability to be paid residuals. That compensation model is now outmoded, leaving writers and actors with just one-time payments, thereby cutting them out of the repeat-viewing revenue stream.
Both the writers and the actors have been successful in casting the corporate studio heads as the villains. How much will the power of public opinion play in this particular work stoppage?
I don’t think that story will resonate so deeply with the public. We’re all so used to living in a world controlled by billionaires. The better pitch to the public is: If we lose our strikes, your jobs are next, because your work can also be done by an algorithm or a robot.
In other words, the unions should put a human face on their strikes, not just “We want our cut of the profits.”
Post-pandemic box office receipts have been down as theatergoers adjust their consumption patterns to streaming movies at home. The studios have likewise adjusted by producing more name-brand episodic shows tailored exclusively for home viewing. Does having these successful online channels give the studios an edge in negotiations?
The strike is more complicated than usual because the employers are really fighting against each other, even though they are bargaining as one entity. In other words, what’s good for Netflix and Amazon – the new producers of entertainment content – is not so good for a traditional studio such as Disney, because Disney has been tied to the traditional movie distribution system even as it has moved into the streaming space.
Do you foresee the issue of rapidly encroaching and disruptive technology affecting other segments of the labor market?
The 1981 Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization strike during former President Ronald Reagan’s administration set the tone for aggressive employer bargaining with unions. That pattern was in place for 40 years until the COVID-19 pandemic upended it.
Now, the tables are turned as people think very differently about their work. Workers are much more willing to fight for better wages and working conditions. So, whether technology is the issue or more basic things like pay that keeps up with inflation or a work-life balance schedule, a new age of labor activism has dawned.
Editor’s note: To contact Michael LeRoy, call 217-244-4092; email mhl@illinois.edu.
