It got here as no shock to anybody when the Writers Guild of America West’s 2023 annual monetary report confirmed that tv and movie writers’ earnings and employment had declined the identical 12 months that union members waged a 148-day strike towards studios and streamers.
However one 12 months later, in a piece stoppage-free atmosphere, employment dipped additional than their strike-era ranges, at the same time as earnings barely rebounded. That’s in response to the union’s 2024 annual monetary report, launched Friday to members and reviewed by The Hollywood Reporter.
The doc finds that in 2024 the entire variety of WGA West members reporting earnings fell 9.4 % in contrast with the prior 12 months and 24.3 % from 2022. At $1.5 billion, members’ complete earnings rose 12.7 % in contrast with 2023, however have been nonetheless 21 % under 2022’s $1.9 billion.
It’s the most recent signal of Hollywood corporations lowering their output in a post-Peak TV, post-strikes world as a extra cautious and risk-averse enterprise tradition has taken maintain. “We anticipate 2024’s numbers to extend in subsequent reviews, with late reporting to extend the variety of writers employed to a stage just like 2023,” the union’s annual report acknowledged. “Nonetheless, it’s clear that the variety of jobs has declined from peak years, attributable to the businesses’ pullback in variety of streaming tasks on high of prior declines in linear programming.”
The employment declines have been steepest in tv and digital platforms in addition to in information, promotion, informational and interactive programming. Tv and digital platform author employment dropped almost 11 % between 2023 and 2024 and 28.5 % from 2022. The WGA West represents 1000’s of writers in that class; on a smaller scale, information, promotion, informational and interactive programming writers dropped from 108 in 2022 to 94 in 2023 to 80 in 2024, a decline of almost 26 %.
In tv, author earnings rose 12.3 % in 2024 in contrast with the 12 months prior, however dropped 25 % when weighed towards 2022. In its information and promotion class, earnings dropped 9.3 % in contrast with 2023 and 1.1 % from 2022.
Author employment fared higher in theatrical movies. The decline in 2024 in contrast with 2023 was solely three % however 16.2 % in relation to 2022. The hit to earnings in movie in contrast with two years prior wasn’t as stark as in tv, both: Earnings rose in 2024 by 14.2 % in distinction to the 12 months prior and was 9.5 % decrease than the 2022 complete.
Residuals have been additionally down in 2024 in contrast with 2023, declining six %. Nonetheless, a rise over a five-year interval supplied some house for optimism: The reuse funds have been up 19.3 % in contrast with 2019. The decline in tv residuals was 12.4 % in contrast with 2023, whereas in function movie it was 6.4 %.
The WGA West supplied members an early peek at their information on tv author declines in April, when the union revealed that throughout the 2023-2024 season, author jobs have been down 42 %. “Writing careers have at all times been tough to entry and maintain, however the contraction has made it particularly difficult,” the union mentioned in an e-mail. “We’re all topic to the choices of the businesses that management this business, who’ve pulled again spending on content material based mostly on the calls for of Wall Road.”