Working Life

   I recall walking the picket lines in the sleet and rain in 2007-2008 during the Writer Guild strike. And now it seems like we might be in for another round: Bitter disputes over health and pension payments to union members have created plenty of drama in states and cities this year. But do not […]

Read the full story

  I’ve watched the internal divisions at the Screen Actors Guild with sadness. A united SAG, and a strong creators’ labor movement, would be a great boon for all workers. But, it seems to be getting worse. Here is a short primer–and why you should care.   I’ve written about the building strife recently. The […]

Read the full story

   I pause for a moment from the discussion about the auto industry to check out what is happening in the actors’ house of labor. It ain’t pretty. Some of you may have read that there has been a long on-going internal fight in the Screen Actors Guild since…well, really, this goes back 20 years […]

Read the full story

    Sometimes getting a deal made isn’t the last word. Yesterday, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists announced that its members had approved the deal it had struck with producers. The margin was fairly healthy–62 percent–but not as large as previous contract votes. But, to get to the contract deal, AFTRA had to […]

Read the full story

    I don’t make a habit of referring to articles written by one of the worst reporters on the face of the earth but I will make an exception today. Yesterday, Michael Cieply had this story in the Times: Leaders of the Screen Actors Guild publicly declared war on a fellow actors’ union at a […]

Read the full story

    I recently bemoaned the unfortunate conflict between the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA). Well, little did I know that it could get worse: Attempting to throw a monkey wrench into a new contract between the Hollywood studios and the American Federation of Television and Radio […]

Read the full story

    Ah, internal labor strife all around…I’m on my way to Puerto Rico for the SEIU convention where, I’m sure you’ve heard, there will be quite the debate. Every time I think about writing something about the debate in and around SEIU, I get a headache–partly from reading the shallow and knee-jerk coverage emanating from […]

Read the full story

    No surprise: the members of the WGA voted to pull down their picket signs and go back to work pending a vote on the actual deal. This from today’s Los Angeles Times: More than 90% of the 3,775 writers who cast ballots in Los Angeles and New York voted to immediately end the work […]

Read the full story

    No surprise: the members of the WGA voted to pull down their picket signs and go back to work pending a vote on the actual deal. This from today’s Los Angeles Times: More than 90% of the 3,775 writers who cast ballots in Los Angeles and New York voted to immediately end the work […]

Read the full story

    As most of you know by now, the Writers Guild of America officially announced that it has reached a deal with Big Media to bring an end to its strike. That happened over the weekend (and yours truly has tried to stick to a no-weekend blogging rule for sanity sake) so I thought I’d […]

Read the full story