Unions Urging Actors Not To Work On Hobbit Movie

lbalbalba writes "Last we heard about The Hobbit, Guillermo Del Toro dropped out, Peter Jackson was unofficially directing and secretly auditioning actors, the movie had yet to be green-lit, and Ian McKellen was getting super-antsy about the whole thing and threatening not to play Gandalf. This shouldn't help the long-gestating movie happen any quicker: Actors guilds including SAG issued actual alerts yesterday against working on any of the Hobbit films, advising their members not to take parts in the non-union production, should they be offered them."

Comments

First Union?

[Chas]

Bah. While there's no doubt that, at one point, unions served a vital purpose in protecting workers from abuse, nowadays, they're merely another expensive middle-man cost. Paid for by the protection racket^H^H^H^union dues and ultimately by the consumer.

Thank you, no.

Re:First Union?

[Planesdragon]

nowadays, they're merely another expensive middle-man cost

Unions are paid directly by their membership, or in certain legislated instances, directly by those they represent in contract negotiations.

The only "middle-man" cost to a union is the wages that workers receive when they bargain collectively. To argue that this is an "increased" cost, you need to refute the union's basic premise -- that collective bargaining brings about a "fair" wage.

While you're about it, please include an example where everyone having to haggle for the cost of a head of lettuce is also "fair", please.

Re:First Union?

[Kenja]

Yes. You pay them, and then they tell you when you're allowed to work. Got a mortgage? Too bad, someone three states over called for a strike, so you dont get to work this month.

Not saying its all bad, group bargaining is important. But often the union organizers are in it for themselves rather then the members.

Re:First Union?

[Improv]

Unions still serve the same role they ever did. It's an important role.

It may impose cost, but whatever costs it imposes are the other side of keeping it being a reasonable and workable thing to be an actor.

In modern times, we don't need less collective bargaining, we need more. If, for example, medical interns had a union to prevent 16-hour shifts, I imagine we could agree that to be a step forward. Cost to consumer is not the only thing worth optimising in society, and harmful competition still exists.

Re:First Union?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah that is why CEO pay is now 300x the average worker versus 30x. The problem with the American Dream is everyone thinks one day they will be rich, so lets make all the laws good for rich people.

The middle class should be very powerful - however the decepticons - I mean the republicans - have convinced everyone the unions, public options for health care, etc are all communist.

The top marginal tax rate has been on a downward trend since the sixties. Income trends reflect the upper 20% are earning more and more percentage of the total national income - unions are one way to fight this.

But sure convince yourself we don't need them, and ask yourself in 20 years why there are rich and poor and no middle class.

Re:First Union?

[Magic5Ball]

Unions have also claimed to attempt to secure equal pay for equal work, which remains an outstanding concern for particular genders and races. Since unions have not succeeded in closing such gaps over decades since the industrial safety problems were resolved, but instead have installed a seniority regime that systematically ignores workers' performance of their duties in determining wages and job security, we should be open to breaking the unions' monopoly on representing worker rights.

Re:First Union?

[Adrian Lopez]

What sort of amendment to the First Amendment would you have in mind to prevent collective bargaining by employees with their more powerful employers^W^W^W^W^W^W^W^W^Wprotection rackets?

If freedom of association means employees have the right to join a union and engage in collective bargaining, then surely it also means they have the right to either join a different union (which the law often prevents under "sole bargaining agent" provisions) or not be represented by any union at all (which, again, is not always possible).

Re:First Union?

[Reverberant]

Bah. While there's no doubt that, at one point, unions served a vital purpose in protecting workers from abuse, nowadays, they're merely another expensive middle-man cost.

Tell that to the workers of the Upper Big Branch Mine.

Re:First Union?

[bhcompy]

Because the wrong people invariably end up with the job security and ridiculous pension. There is no real method in typical US union contracts for weeding out the bad, since they're seniority based rather than performance based when it comes to job security.

Re:First Union?

[FuckingNickName]

It makes it impossible for people who do well to get ahead and to remove the people who do a sub-par job.

In what way does it make it "impossible"? I mean, in countries with a history of high unionisation rates such as Germany, is nothing of good quality ever built because the good men are kept down and the bad men are kept on?

It's perfectly possible for bad negotiations between the union and employer to result temporarily in something like you describe, just like it is possible for a businessman to choose his son to take the reins rather than his best performing underling, but there is nothing inevitable about this. And, in both cases, the long-term effect is that the company will not succeed (assuming its success is not guaranteed somehow, e.g.if by government).

people stop thinking for themselves and instead have devotion to their union which even influences how they vote.

And again, you're using a pathological extreme. Of course you show loyalty to those who have an understanding of your plight and your interests in mind, but you must still remain vigilant for corruption or plain bad decision-making. To what individual in any particular grouping of primates formed for whatever reason does this not apply?

For example, if you walk out of the job and strike, you should be able to be fired, no questions asked, you broke your end of the contract.

OK, but then everyone else will strike.

Re:First Union?

[FuckingNickName]

In short of course you have the right to assemble and collectively bargain all you want, but your employer shouldn't be forced by law to assist you with that.

Unfortunately, this thread is full of people starting off with the premise "there is a problem with union law" (including single-union laws which are effectively anti-union) and assuming the conclusion "there is a problem with unions". Disney copyright extensions are bad, but that doesn't necessarily mean all businesses which make their money with the help of copyright protections are pure evil.

Re:First Union?

[Ironsides]

The formation of a corporation is collective decision-making and bargaining by owners of the means of production. Major shareholders are the rich guys, and even minor shareholders have a certain degree of control of the means of production. These are the powers exerted over the worker which he counters with collective bargaining.

By exercising monopoly control over the access to the labor for entire regions? Something that if the owners did, would be ruled illegal. Want wiring done in an area? You have to use local labor. Want to use a specific person? All the labor will be forced to boycott you if he isn't a member of the local. Or for the individuals: Want to work at a union shop? You have to join the union. The employer wants to higher you? Too bad, the law says if a simple majority of the employees want to unionize, everyone is forced to be part of the union. Control of the production is irrelevant if it is not controlled by a monopoly. Control of the Labor has been consolidated under monolithic monopolistic unions in several areas.

It is pretty much only the US middle class which considers the US to be marked by "doing our best at what we do". If what you said were true, you would see precisely the opposite thing happening to what is actually happening to the US middle class.

What is "actually happening to the US middle class"?

The workers experiencing the worst treatment may no longer be in the US and the UK, and certain Unions may be old enough that they have become inefficient, but the nature of business has not changed.

With union representation at such a low, it appears it has changed. In the US at least. I don't have the numbers for the UK. Maybe they are needed in other countries, but not in the US anymore.

Re:First Union?

[Low Ranked Craig]

What say you?

I say that anyone who can look at our current corporatocracy and claim with a straight face that "the unions are MORE powerful than their employers" -- or even present that state of affairs as a plausible scenario -- is completely disconnected from reality.

Two words for you: General Motors

Re:First Union?

[Teancum]

If that is all labor unions did in America, perhaps it would be useful.... or at least stick with employer/labor relations.

One of the major complaints is if you happen to be in that 40% minority that wants the labor union to go take a hike, but none the less the labor union dues are still being taken out of your paycheck and are being used to finance the election campaigns of politicians that you absolutely don't agree with. Furthermore, the labor "leaders" are in turn padding their expense accounts and becoming personally wealthy on the backs of the union members in a fashion that sometimes would make even a CEO blush.

Yes, you can find some exceptions of a frugal labor leader who is genuinely trying to make a difference, but usually the labor union exists for its own sake and not for its members.

Re:First Union?

[Urza9814]

But often the union organizers are in it for themselves rather then the members.

If that's the case, then you need to get a new union. Immediately.

My mother was one of the founders of the nurses union at the hospital where she works. Prior to unionizing, wages sucked. Working conditions sucked. Nurses were harassed by doctors, and fired if they complained. Nurses were told that if the equipment to lift an overweight patient onto another bed wasn't available, just lift them up yourself. Led to a lot of back problems with the nurses - but if they didn't do it, they'd be fired. When the movement to unionize started, the hospital hired private detectives to follow some of the organizing nurses. For a few days there was a detective parked outside of our house, 24/7 watching our family.

Now: wages are a lot better. Nurses aren't required to injure themselves. When doctors occasionally start screaming and swearing at a nurse, the nurse can complain without being fired - or just pull out their cellphone and say 'keep talking, I'm recording this' - that tends to solve the issue. Prior to the union, any nurse with the courage to do that would have been fired. And in general, relations between the nurses and management is a _lot_ better now. It was a bit strained at first, but it's improved immensely.

Of course, I'm not going to say that _all_ unions are _always_ good - there was this English teacher in my highschool for example who essentially decided she just wasn't going to teach anymore. We watched probably 10+ movies in her class, and did several huge assignments that just never got graded - a few more that never even got turned in. She was late nearly every day, and didn't even show up at least 5 days out of every month. At the end of the year she did "resign", but the rumor was that she would have been fired _much_ sooner, but she had tenure, and the union made it incredibly difficult to fire even teachers who were blatantly just not doing their jobs.

In my opinion, unions are generally good. Union organizers are generally good. But as with anything else, if they become too powerful, you will have problems. But then, without a union all that power belongs to the employer, which isn't a good situation either.

Re:First Union?

[seebs]

And how do you "get a new union" when the current union has a legal contract saying that the employer is not allowed to hire anyone in your line of work who isn't a member of that current union?

Unions, churches, political parties... They start out because people have a vision of what they want to accomplish, but within a generation or so they exist to preserve and/or advance their own temporal power, and that means finding ways to keep people under their control.

eh?

[Dyinobal]

Aren't these the same movies (producers?) that used 'hollywood accounting' to turn virtually no profit and thus dodge paying a huge chunk of money to Tolkien's trust or what ever they call themselves?

See how destructive unions can be?

[commodore64_love]

>>>"The Do Not Work Order tells actors, "If you are contacted to be engaged on The Hobbit please notify your union immediately."

It should be up to the actors whether or not they want to work on a non-union film. But I guess this is what happens when you make megaliths like corporations... there has to be counter-balancing force like the union, and the citizen gets squashed in the middle.

Re:See how destructive unions can be?

[Improv]

If you say "oh hey only do this if you feel like it", collective bargaining gives way to a "race to the bottom" as employers hire the people who are willing to break ranks. The benefit of all is better served by standing together.

Re:See how destructive unions can be?

[funkatron]

This only holds if the union doesn't provide enough benefit to stop people from wanting to break ranks. And if there not doing that then there's no reason for them to be there at all.

Re:See how destructive unions can be?

[Sycraft-fu]

Ya well few problems with that:

1) Talented people have no difficulty finding other work, and thus the competition keeps pay high. You may notice that there are a lot of non-union jobs out there that are quite good. I don't see CCIEs needing a union, they seem to be able to find work for lots of money. When you have a talent that is in demand, that alone takes care of compensation. People have to pay to keep you. This is the case with actors. They are in demand.

2) Much of the "Race to the bottom" you talk about has been taken care of by the government. If you research labour unions you find they came about because of industries with extremely exploitative and dangerous practices. That is now handled rather efficiently by oversight agencies like OSHA. They can bring more heat on an employer than a union ever could. In particular with Hollywood we aren't talking about minors who are perpetually in debt to the company store and working in dangerous conditions. We are talking about rich people working in the environment they choose.

3) Unions often crease a "race to the bottom" for employees. The protection of any and everyone leads to a situation where bad employees cannot be gotten rid of. That increases costs over all, and thus mean less compensation for good employees. In particular, many unions favour seniority over all else. So no matter your talent, no matter your work ethic, you are forced in to the same pay as everyone else at your level.

4) You have to deal with the realities of the world, and that there is non-union competition. I am not just talking about 3rd world sweatshop labour. Have a look at the American car companies. They compete with companies who are non-union, and build their cars right in America, like Toyota. Companies that pay well, have good working environments, but are not union and lack that overhead. You have to compete with that and unions tend to be bad at it.

I'm sorry but I just see a massive divide between the sort of pay and conditions that lead to unions back in the day, and the places where there are unions now. When you have a good work environment and make good money, you do not need a union.

Unions

[Adrian Lopez]

Unions are supposed to represent their members' interests, but the way unions behave these days I often wonder if it's not the members who are serving their unions. SAG prohibits is actors from working on non-union productions, and if it weren't for "right to work" statutes they would likely get away with it too. I do appreciate the need for pressure against employers who refuse to give fair treatment and compensation to their employees, but I often feel that unions are yet one more bureaucracy that employees have to deal with.

Re:Unions

[noidentity]

An organization is initially created for a specific purpose, but once met, it keeps on living, with its primary goal to justify its continued existence.

Re:Unions

[AK Marc]

Unions limit economic freedom and prevent progress.

Yes, we know. 100 shareholders get together and form a corporation and that's proper capitalist freedom. 100 workers get together to form a union and they are communist freedom-hating Luddites. Forgive me if I ignore everything that comes out of the mouth of someone who evidently has no grasp of reality. Both are bad. One is a reaction to the other. And both have morphed into something other than intended over the years. But unions are a valid and necessary reaction to corporations and their actions. They never would have existed if the corporations weren't screwing employees as much as possible, so blame unions on the corporations. They worked really hard to get them started.

Re:Unions

[BasilBrush]

Unions limit economic freedom and prevent progress. With collective bargaining, everyone is looked at as interchangeable when in reality they aren't. There are some people who need to be fired because they are bad at their job, while other people should be promoted because they are better at theirs. Unions prevent this from happening, and prevent the basic economic right of seeking employment wherever you see fit.

Using the example of this story, it's easy to see that this is so oversimplified it is untrue. There are those that are not interchangeable - big actors whose name on a poster will increase box office. But there are many more - e.g. the actors playing orcs - that are are very much interchangeable. They are very poorly paid - to the extent that they typically need to work as waiters or behind bars between acting jobs. This doesn't necessarily come from being bad at their jobs - many very good actors can't get much work. It comes from the fact that the public can only remember a limited number of stars at any one time. And those that manage to get there do so from a mix of hard work, talent, nature's gift of good looks, luck, breaks etc. Not just hard work.

Supply and demand is what makes the interchangable actor's rewards low. Not lack of effort or being bad at their job. It's perfectly reasonable for such people to group together to create collective bargaining situation where they are less exploited.

Re:Unions

[SolarStorm]

I can

I worked as a prof in a local college that had a "Professional Association" (read expensive union)

When I stated that I would prefer not to join, I was told it was a requirement. But they asked why. I told them, I would rather negotiate my employment conditions as I could do a more effective job representing my skills and their value than a simple grid that listed years of experience and years of education. As an example. I earned the same salary teaching Advanced C Programming (yes this was a while ago) and earned the same salary as the prof teaching a high school math upgrader. My marking alone took many more hours than the multiple choice exams my office mate had.

In 1996 the college went through a downsizing. Since I was the last man hired, I was the first man to be released. The students actually demonstrated to keep me. ( I was the only prof who had actually done real development work in C, the others that they kept actually sat in my lecture in the morning and attempted to reteach in their afternoon block )

At one point, I thought I would try and work with the system. I booked a meeting with my union rep and made a proposal for a 3rd dimension on the salary grid. Course difficulty. I actually had it mapped out quite well with research from the colleges own industry reports where salary would now be based on length of employment, education, and teaching load. Where the classes were ranked on load. This would then become the 3rd dimension to the grid. I even volunteered to present it at the next meeting.

The answer I got was, "This looks nice, but you elected me as a representative, it is my job to decide what should be put in collective agreements. You then vote on what your union officials decree". My proposal never got a second meeting, nor acknowledgment anywhere.

When the downsizing happened, students complained (in numbers) to the dean, I even suggested to some that they try the union. The information I got back from the union was that they agreed with the college about downsizing so that they could maintain the current salary grid for those remaining. Now if you look at this politically. If you want to maintain your rep seat, keep the people that are staying happy. To bad for those released, but they wont be paying dues next year.

Another example of a real union was the Transit Union. When I was going through school, I drove a bus at night to pay for my college. If a driver called in sick, dispatch could force you to drive a double shift, and once I drove a triple shift. However, because money was important, you were allowed to drive a shift for another driver and he would pay you. The only difference was, if you drove more than 48 hrs that week you were not allowed to pick up another shift. Here is the catch, Say you traded your Tuesday night shift to study and picked up someones shift on the weekend, and then on Wed, dispatch forced to drive an extra shift, you would not be allowed to drive the shift you traded for on the weekend because the time system said you had too many hours.

Off I went to the union meeting, asking that this be looked into. The membership in attendance voted almost unanimously, a couple of abstainers, in favor of discussing this with management and looking at it during the contract negotiations. This was the last I heard of the proposal. When I asked about it, I was told more important issues came up. Some of the items that did get negotiated were absurd at best. "Seat covers for the drivers seat" for example.

In the end any union or prof association I have ever belonged to has only managed to lower my salary to what I have been able to negotiate myself, collect fees from me, and not carry forward any of my concerns. Most were more interested in keeping their own rep posting.

Last example. My father owned a tin smith shop. He employed approximately 30ish tradesmen. One day a few of them got together and decided that it was time that the shop become a union shop. Sometimes you have t

Union Shop/Closed Shop.

[Jason Pollock]

I think that the union is trying to have US-style closed shops in New Zealand. Not a good plan.

"Closed Shops" are (from what I read) frowned upon (if not illegal) in New Zealand. It is up to the individual whether or not they join the union and pick up the collective contract. You can't force them, and you can't say, "You can only hire union members". This is different to the US and Canada which still allow "union shops" to exist.

Thankfully, Peter Jackson covers this in his statement:

    "He always honoured actors' union conditions if they were union members"

You want to have a full union membership in the cast? Approach them and ask them to join.

Re:The guilds are even dumber

[hansamurai]

Remember, the guild cares deeply about their members getting proper credit

I guess "their" is the key word, as they weren't interested in actually representing how the movie was made, but by who was actually paying the guild their dues. Seems like it really is all about the "money-men" still.

Re:The guilds are even dumber

[im_thatoneguy]

This is why rules need to be flexible, and when all parties can come to mutually agreed upon alternative contracts then they should have the ability to waive them.

The rules are flexible. The guild can offer waivers. The Guild often DOES issue waivers.

In this instance the Guild rejected Rodriguez's argument that Frank Miller did enough to be worthy of a directing credit. If you can demonstrate that you're a legitimate directing team working collaboratively they will grant directing credits.

99% of the time this rule protects its guild members. Issuing waivers whenever the director "asks" for it would be the same as removing the rule. "Would you like to direct Lord of the Rings?" "You bet!" "Ok here's the deal though, if you do it, I'm going to be co-director and I want you to ask for a waiver." "Ok, I guess, if it gets me to direct LOTR!"

In no time flat the Directing credit would be going to every moneybag who showed up to set one day and made an offhand remark.

Re:One does not...

[inanet]

A big issue here in NZ is that it is illegal to force people into unions, and what the SAG and the other unions are trying to force,
is that everyone must have a union contract.

in NZ it must be an Opt-in collective, it cannot be compulsory. however that is exactly what SAG, FIA, et al are trying to force.

Re:One does not...

[john82]

No one should be compelled to be a member of a union as a condition of employment.

Re:One does not...

[Miseph]

How so? They're urging current members not to work on the film because the producers have opted not to meet union conditions. This is the only power the SAG actually has, and it is otherwise a complete waste of everybody's time.

They have not, and cannot, force the film to use union actors or meet union conditions, nor can they force people to join their union, nor can they prevent union members from participating (they could, in theory, expel any members who do... but that is fairly unlikely, and doesn't keep them from doing the project regardless).

For all the anti-union rhetoric and sentiment out there, at least in the US, union membership has steadily and dramatically declined during the past 30 years. The combined annual budget of all unions is substantially lower than each of the lobbying budgets for most of the Fortune 100 (ie. Wal-Mart spends more on lobbying than the AFL-CIO, Teamsters, SAG, etc. COMBINED spend on everything). They are particularly powerful, they are not particularly wealthy, they are not particularly abusive, and they certainly aren't scary enough to warrant all of the fear people have of them.

Re:One does not...

[drsmithy]

[...] and Democrats have to go insane leftist to win their primaries.

Helpful note for people in the rest of the Western world: "insane leftist" in the USA means "slightly right of center" for you.

Re:One does not...

[LurkerXXX]

Sorry, but the Republicans haven't been fiscally conservative since before Regan started the deficit ramp up. Calling the last Republican administration's policy 'fiscally conservative' is laughable. More like 'bat shit insane'. Long ago the Republican's were fiscally conservative, and I agreed with most of their fiscal policies. That was long, long ago.