The Writers Guild of America shared a brand new employment evaluation confirming what you already know: there’s no work on the market.
The guild shared that based mostly on its knowledge, the 2023-’24 TV season had 1,319 fewer author jobs than the prior season, impacting writers in any respect ranges of seniority. That’s the results of 37 % fewer episodic sequence within the ’23-’24 season in comparison with ’22-’23, or simply 223 exhibits in comparison with 362 the 12 months earlier than. The declines are additionally effectively under pre-pandemic ranges, when roughly 345 coated WGA sequence had been on air.
The WGA additionally stated that screenwriting was down too: for the primary three quarters of 2024, the variety of screenwriters working was down 15 % in comparison with 2022, and earnings had been down 6 % in comparison with 2022 (they had been up from 2023).
“Writing careers have all the time been tough to entry and maintain, however the contraction has made it particularly difficult,” the WGA West management wrote in a letter to members and obtained by IndieWire. “We’re all topic to the choices of the businesses that management this trade, who’ve pulled again spending on content material based mostly on the calls for of Wall Road. Compounding that, the present administration appears intent on inflicting financial chaos and undermining our democracy.”
The numbers on this examine cowl writers rooms and jobs from each earlier than and after the Writers Strike of 2023. Full employment numbers for the calendar 12 months of 2024 can be obtainable within the WGA’s annual report this summer season. Although nonetheless months away from being accomplished, the WGA has at the moment tracked 380 employees author, story editor, and government story editor positions for the brand new season, which is for now nonetheless under ’23-24 for that decrease degree of writing job.
The WGA says screenwriters for movies are feeling the strain of contraction as effectively, however the variety of WGA-covered movies launched yearly has stayed constant. 197 completely different movies coated by the guild had been launched in 2024.
Writers fought for larger wages, protections towards synthetic intelligence changing their work, and better streaming residuals, amongst different positive factors, through the strike in 2023. Additionally they obtained bonuses for exhibits that attain the very best tiers of viewership on streamers, nevertheless it’s unclear what number of exhibits or writers have seen the payouts from that new contract. A report from March nevertheless instructed that no less than 5 sequence, “Griselda,” “Ted,” “Bridgerton: Season 3,” “Avatar: The Final Airbender,” and “Fallout,” all obtained performance-metric bonuses.