1982 animators' strike

Multiple labor strikes occurred in the American animation industry during the 1930s and 1940s, such as the Disney animators' strike in 1941.[1]

Unionization in the American animation industry began in the 1930s.[1] At the time, workers in the industry saw unionizing as a way to combat poor working conditions, which included workweeks of over 40 hours without overtime pay, high production quotas, and a lack of credit for their work.[2] Through the 1930s and 1940s, labor unions attempted to organize workers at many different animation studios, resulting in numerous labor disputes.[3] The industry's first major labor strike occurred in 1937 when workers at Fleischer Studios in New York City went on strike.[4] Other notable strikes during this time include the 1941 Disney animators' strike at Walt Disney Productions and a 1947 strike at Terrytoons that was the longest in the industry's history, lasting 28 weeks.[1] By January 1942, this strong push amongst labor organizers had resulted in 90 percent of animators in the United States belonging to a union.[1] While much of this push had come from the Screen Cartoonist's Guild, a union that was founded in 1938, by the 1950s, the Guild was gradually replaced in popularity by another union, the Motion Picture Screen Cartoonists (MPSC) Local 839, and by 1970, the Guild had ceased to exist.[1]

The Supreme Court's ruling in the 1948 case United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. severely hurt the animation industry, especially regarding the creation of animated short films, and in the decade that followed, animation studios began to explore new options to reduce costs.[5] This included outsourcing animation work from countries other than the United States, a process known in the industry as a runaway production.[5] The first major animation project to be created as a runaway production was the 1950s series The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle and Friends.[6] According to the show's creator, work they considered "above the line" (more creative processes such as directing, storyboarding, and animating) were done in the United States, while work considered "below the line" (more labor-intensive tasks such as inking and painting) were done at an animation studio in Mexico City.[7] However, for much of the decade, the prohibitive costs associated with shipping, logistics, and customs offset the potential savings that animation studios stood to gain by outsourcing.[5] Additionally, animators and producers in the United States viewed animation produced in other countries as often being of lesser quality, with the creators of Rocky and Bullwinkle eventually deciding against future runaway productions due in part to the quality of the animation they had received from the Mexican studio.[8] However, starting in the 1960s, it became much more common for studios to outsource parts of the animation process to other countries, primarily in Asia and Europe.[8][9] One reason for this trend was the growth in popularity of animated series made for television.[10] Hanna-Barbera, an American animation studio that produced many projects for television, had seen a rapid growth during this time and by the 1960s, the studio announced plans to outsource.[10][11] Beginning in the early 1970s, the company began to outsource more and more of its projects to countries such as South Korea and Taiwan.[11] Many of the countries where outsourcing occurred had much weaker labor laws and union presence was either not as strong as it was in the United States or was nonexistent, leading to significantly lower wages for the animation workers in these countries compared to the United States.[10] By 1978, three-quarters of the production work carried out by Hanna-Barbera was occurring outside of their own studio.[12]

The American animation industry, centered around Los Angeles, had been organized in the 1940s, and by the 1970s, the Motion Picture Screen Cartoonists (MPSC) Local 839 was the main union representing the workers and negotiating contracts between the major animation studios. By the 1970s, the main issue of contention between the union and companies concerned outsourcing, with studios such as Hanna-Barbera and Walt Disney Productions subcontracting non-unionized animators from outside of the United States to perform production work on their projects. By 1978, 75 percent of the production work on Hanna-Barbera animation was occurring outside of their studios.

As runaway productions became more common, more American animators became concerned with limiting the amount of work that studios were outsourcing.[13] During contract negotiations between studios and the union in 1969, there were some discussions regarding runaway productions, but it was ultimately put aside as both sides negotiated over the issue of residuals instead.[13] Additionally, MPSC's business agent at the time, Larry Kilty, was mostly uninterested in issues regarding television animation.[14] Kilty's successor, Lou Appet, had been a vocal labor activist since the 1930s, but for much of his tenure as business agent he was involved in a legal dispute with his predecessor.[14] In 1978, Appet retired, and the executive board that replaced him included individuals who decided to act more confrontationally with studios regarding runaway productions.[14] During contract negotiations that occurred that year, the union included a provision that would have barred studios from subcontracting production work outside of Los Angeles County, California, in all cases "unless ... sufficient employees with the qualifications required to produce a program or series are unavailable".[14] Commercial studios and Disney were not included in this agreement, as at the time they had no plans to outsource their work, and Filmation, a company that prided itself on keeping its production work local, signed a "me-too" agreement to honor the clause.[14] The studios that the union were primarily targeting with this clause were Hanna-Barbera, Bakshi Productions, DePatie–Freleng Enterprises, Marvel Comics, and Ruby-Spears, as well as other smaller companies.[14] While some smaller studios agreed to the clause, others, including Hanna-Barbera, were steadfastly opposed to the clause.[10][15] Additionally, they believed that, regardless of the negotiations, the union would not call a strike over the issue, as the union had never been involved in one in their history up to that point.[15]

During the 1979 strike, animators picketed outside of Hanna-Barbera's studio on Cahuenga Boulevard (pictured 2007).[16]

Due to the impasse between the union and several studios over the runaway production clause, the union decided to declare a strike on August 7, 1979.[15] The move caught many studio executives by surprise, as this was the union's first ever strike action.[15] At Hanna-Barbera, the main target of the strike, several hundred employees picketed outside of the studio, prompting the Los Angeles Police Department to send officers.[17] Studio cofounder William Hanna expressed sympathy for the strikers, telling one picketer, "I understand exactly what you are going through and sympathize completely".[16][18] The strike came during a critical time for the studios, as many of the studios were trying to produce content in time for the beginning of the fall television season that September, and a missed deadline could have seriously jeopardized their contracts with the Big Three television networks for Saturday-morning cartoons.[18][17] Faced with this possibility, the studios agreed to the clause after several days of striking.[note 1] The strike and resulting contract, which had a three-year length,[20] were largely seen as a success for the union, and within a week, Ruby-Spears incurred a $50,000 fine from the union for violating the runaway production clause.[17]

Following the strike, many animation studios began to make changes so as to continue outsourcing their productions.[20] For starters, many companies circumvented the clause by simply reducing their local production capacity through firings, allowing them to continue to outsource work to other countries.[19] Prior to 1979, Hanna-Barbera employed many Canadian graduates from Sheridan College, but after the strike, the company revoked their O-1B visas, forcing many of them to return to Canada.[20] While the union had the opportunity to contest visas, it was unlikely that the federal government would have allowed them to veto that many, and Hanna-Barbera told many of these workers that their visas being revoked was the union's fault.[20] At the same time, many studios began to negotiate deals with start-up studios in Canada, South Korea, and Taiwan, regarding outsourcing.[20][1] Meanwhile, MPSC attempted to strengthen their cause by pressuring their members into not working for studios that had still not ratified a union contract.[20] Animators who did so were fined by the union, leading to some dissension among the union members.[20] By 1982, despite the clause, Hanna-Barbera was outsourcing about two-thirds of their total animation work from studios in South Korea and Taiwan.[21] By the time contract negotiations were set to come up again, many of the studios were willing to fight back against the union's push for greater protections against runaway productions, leading to another labor strike.

In 1982, as the contract was set to expire, negotiators from the union and the studios met to discuss the terms of a new contract.[22][23] While the negotiators had numerous points of contention regarding such topics as minimum wage, sick leave, and allocating screen credits,[21] the biggest issue by far concerned runaway productions.[23] While the union sought to expand the coverage and enforcement of the clause they had included in the previous contract,[22] many studios wanted the provision removed entirely.[21] At the time, the union represented about 1,600 members and had contracts in place with 45 studios, though a majority of the production work occurred at just a few studios, including Disney, Filmation, Marvel, and Hanna-Barbera.[23] Picketing commenced outside many studios, and work on existing projects was halted. However, the strike lacked support from MPSC's parent union, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, and many of the studios were in a better position to weather the strike than they had been in in 1979. As a result, many of the larger studios held out against the union's demands and opted to outlast the union, which struggled to keep up morale among its members, with many of them working under the table for the studios against union orders. In early September, the union allowed members to return to work at smaller studios, and in early October, with many members resigning from the union and returning to work, Local 839 signed an agreement with studios that did not include protections against runaway productions, leading to the strike's end on October 16.

On July 31, about 400 members of MPSC gathered for a meeting to discuss the contract negotiations and hold a vote to authorize a strike.[22] Following heated debates that continued into the night, the members there voted by a two-thirds margin to authorize the union leadership to call for a strike if needed.[24] Additionally, unlike the 1979 strike, where only a few studios were targeted, the union decided that this strike would involve the entire represented animation industry, as they felt that the scope of the strike would apply more pressure on the studios that were strongly opposed to the runaway productions clause.[24] Additionally, the timing of the strike, much like the 1979 strike, would coincide with the leadup to the fall tv schedule.[21] After several more days of negotiations, the strike was set to commence on August 5.[24]