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Anime is a $25B industry that pays its animators pennies

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Re: Anime is a $25B industry that pays its animators pennies

#51

Post by cmdli »

chasing wrote: post #34
Apreche wrote: post #9

While the industry as a whole makes a lot, the majority of individual anime and manga make next to nothing. It’s a few very popular properties that make all the dough. If people were paid fairly, most productions would be untenable. There would be just a few anime per year instead of many. But also, how would the popular ones come to be? Every new property would be a huge gamble. As an anime and manga fan, I actually…

The "if we paid people fairly things would be prohibitively expensive" argument is a terrible one, just to note. First, it rarely seems to actually be the case since the requirement that employees be paid fairly mostly just drives away low-value efforts. It's also an attitude that, if taken to its logical extreme, demands society have an underpaid underclass that suffers so the rest of us can have nice things.

While I agree with your argument, it's not as simple as "letting the low value efforts die". If most anime were to stop being produced, most of the animators would also be fired and be unable to continue what is (I assume) their passion and career. The simple fact is that there isn't enough money going into the industry to pay all the animators a fair wage, so either animators get paid less or there are fewer animators.

Re: Anime is a $25B industry that pays its animators pennies

#52

Post by ericd »

chasing wrote: post #34
Apreche wrote: post #9

While the industry as a whole makes a lot, the majority of individual anime and manga make next to nothing. It’s a few very popular properties that make all the dough. If people were paid fairly, most productions would be untenable. There would be just a few anime per year instead of many. But also, how would the popular ones come to be? Every new property would be a huge gamble. As an anime and manga fan, I actually…

The "if we paid people fairly things would be prohibitively expensive" argument is a terrible one, just to note. First, it rarely seems to actually be the case since the requirement that employees be paid fairly mostly just drives away low-value efforts. It's also an attitude that, if taken to its logical extreme, demands society have an underpaid underclass that suffers so the rest of us can have nice things.

There's a big difference between unpopular and low-value. And it takes time to get really good at something, it can be helpful to be able to work for less, if your skills aren't yet good enough to command a high value.

Re: Anime is a $25B industry that pays its animators pennies

#53

Post by double0jimb0 »

Moru wrote: post #36
savanaly wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I totally agree with your diagnosis, but I don’t see why it’s considered to be a problem. Why shouldn’t people be free to trade off salary against other desirable traits in a job? Even at the extremes?

Because it's a very uneven power balance. Big company using young inexperienced workers that just want a foot in the door on a childhood dream and have no idea how much their work is worth. Most companies knows to exploit this to the full. Especially known in arts, music and game industry. Less so with (metal) industry jobs where there are old unions helping the workers to a healthier power balance. Except for Musk t…

Tesla as an innovation-driven company couldn’t be further from the types of metal industry jobs you refer to. Why can’t an innovative company trade its “capital” to get the young and ambitious to work for less pay?

Re: Anime is a $25B industry that pays its animators pennies

#54

Post by swells34 »

Ecstatify wrote: post #14
madrox wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tend to agree with you. In the end, salary reflects what the market will put up with, and if you're not willing to take a salary hit to work in games, someone else will. This is why I don't think regulation will fix this. It has to be on the individual to decide what's right for them.

Yeah let’s get rid of minimum wage while we’re at it.

I'd much rather implement a maximum wage, would do a huge amount of good for our society. Let's say a cap on any more than $10M a year for total wealth gain for any individual. Everything else is taxed at 100%. Suddenly, we could all have healthcare, kids would get the supplies they need for school, a UBI scheme would be doable. Basically, we could finally stop acting like a poor third world country.

Re: Anime is a $25B industry that pays its animators pennies

#55

Post by Andrex »

financypants wrote: post #38
Andrex wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If unionization were endemic to the global economy, that might work. Lacking that, power dynamics are such that workers need protections enshrined in legislation. If salaries are a race-to-the-bottom, nobody benefits except the ones doing the hiring. You may have a "job," but the market salary average would be depressed while the companies enjoy a large talent pool of replaceable workers. If I didn't know history too…

When would candidates compete to work for less? I haven’t seen that demonstrated anywhere. I have seen firms compete on pay.

> When would candidates compete to work for less?

The first example to jump out in my mind is gov't contractors, which isn't a direct analogue to workers but the mentality of undercutting your competition to get ahead is basic human nature IMO.

Two candidates vying for the same job wouldn't consciously sabotage each other (let's assume). But if they both give a salary quote, why wouldn't the lower-priced candidate be a more appealing hire? With no protections, it would come down to whoever is willing (or able) to cut more pieces of their body off to win the job.

And that behavior is not conducive to a well-functioning economy that supports a large and contented middle class, which is the preferred economic status of all state actors.

Re: Anime is a $25B industry that pays its animators pennies

#57

Post by gpspake »

vvanders wrote: post #35
madrox wrote: post #3

When I read things like this, I think back on my experience in games and entertainment. I believe that the more generally prestigious the industry is, the more likely it is to see worker exploitation. Part of your pay is wrapped up in getting to brag that you work in industry X on product Y. Almost by definition, that means young, passionate labor. Industry leaders quickly learn how to exploit the young and passionat…

I generally agree, that said we had a number of our animators move into gamedev from traditional VFX roles and from they way they told it gamedev was significantly better, uf da.

What's "uf da?"

Re: Anime is a $25B industry that pays its animators pennies

#58

Post by madrox »

Andrex wrote: post #22
savanaly wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I totally agree with your diagnosis, but I don’t see why it’s considered to be a problem. Why shouldn’t people be free to trade off salary against other desirable traits in a job? Even at the extremes?

If unionization were endemic to the global economy, that might work. Lacking that, power dynamics are such that workers need protections enshrined in legislation. If salaries are a race-to-the-bottom, nobody benefits except the ones doing the hiring. You may have a "job," but the market salary average would be depressed while the companies enjoy a large talent pool of replaceable workers. If I didn't know history too…

Unions were on my mind when I read this. However, for some reason unions don't tend to take over in creative fields or fields of passion. SAG-AFTRA is the only exception to this that I can think of.

This is why I think it's become common practice for tech companies to profit share. We take it for granted now, but it's not common...especially for artists.

Re: Anime is a $25B industry that pays its animators pennies

#59

Post by _sys49152 »

echelon wrote: post #50
huytersd wrote: post #29

It’s only going to get worse with AI now in the mix.

> It’s only going to get worse with AI now in the mix. s/worse/better Soon the creators and artists will be able to make full films without studio capital in the mix. This should start happening by the end of the year. The studio system exists because film and motion media is hard to make. It requires a lot of people, a lot of logistics, and a lot of capital. That's not going to be true for much longer. Soon the webc…

thus the creation of a ai anime market curation to sort the wheat from the chaff, marketing and merchandising and all that.
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