While certainly not the most important hashtag of the last week or so, #AnimationPaidMe seemed to surface quite a bit over the weekend. The purpose, for animation producers to share with the world what kind of pay they get from various companies at different stages in their careers and by whom and whether or not these rates are predicated on race. On first pass, it seems as though most of the producers who stuck with the industries ended up making somewhat decent livings, except when you account for a good lot of them being based in Los Angeles where rents are constantly increasing.
Anyone who thinks any of the major cities in the United States are the future in terms of mainstay animation hubs got a rude awakening to that during COVID-19, and that’s from both sides. On one hand, networks are starting to learn the value of having a steady animation pipeline in case of future world events that could cause live-action productions to shut down. On the other hand, animation producers are starting to understand current technology trends that would allow them to record any voice from anywhere, feature any producer from anywhere with Zoom, make no mistake, remote work is the future of animation production here in North America.
A few things will happen as a result. Animation Guilds and Unions will fall by the wayside. They’ve already proven to be death knells to popular animated series in the past, but what if you didn’t have to worry about them because your animation producers were dotted across the country? Remote work has been part of journalism for years, and outlets like Refinery29, Vice, and Buzzfeed experience certainly adhere to unions and have the negative balance sheets to show for it. But there are numerous publications across the country that don’t have to deal with any of that, examples being GameInformer, CBS Interactive, and the like showing that you can have successful publications sans a union so long as you HQ from a state that doesn’t require them. Point being, just because a publication has a union, it’s not mandatory for workers to be a part of it. The result is getting more work, making more money, and with subsidy programs like Medicare-for-all, the need for representation in negotiations becomes moot.
Mark Cuban in interviews has noted that the future of education in America is Liberal Arts programs, as more and more job categories get automated which includes the likes of accounting, research/data-entry, and underwriting. Package that notion with a future that could include Universal Basic Income getting increased focus after COVID-19 passes, and you have yourselves a recipe for stay-at-home animation producers living anywhere in the United States making enough to get by and not needing a union to do so.
The result of this will see the demand for housing in metropolitan animation hubs drop thereby lowering property taxes and rent charges. Animation production will increase which will see producers/networks needing to pay a bit more to keep the stronger producers on staff not unlike how Silicon Valley titans fight over engineers (as luck would have it, Facebook, Inc has announced that over time, 50% of it’s staff that were previously in office, will permanently be remote) which will further increase the company’s awareness among job-seekers wanting to stay home).
Voice actors will feel a change in the industry well. Note this conversation with pros outspoken about Scoob! and how various roles were recast from fan favorites to more celebrity-driven names. They have a point, celebs taking voice-acting jobs from those working professionals has been a controversial take for years. But, if I were them, I’d be more concerned about anyone who has voice talent that works from home with a podcast microphone thereby being able to not only record, but possibly produce, their own tracks. Seth MacFarlane has a full voice studio at his house today, bands and musicians have been recording full albums in regular houses fitted with sound-proof rooms/closets for decades. Animation is next, and the rise of non-SAG affiliated voices across the world will become so much so that everyone will have to take what they can get OR allow to name their own fee in competitive bidding situations.
So, what does this all have to do with #AnimationPaidMe ? In closing, it’s the DNA. Prices in animation production will fluctuate over the next couple of years as the rise of tech lowers the barriers of entry, leaving the old ways of how people get paid far-behind. Equality in the work place is more than just social issues, and while those are important too, real equality will be had in the coming years because the cream always rises, and talent, not standardization, always wins out.