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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

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.

cmdli 3y ago
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.
- kmeisthax 3y ago
  Vocational awe is a curse. If you have an endless supply of people willing to work pennies then the industry will build itself around paying them pennies. This does not mean that this is the only way you can build an animation industry - just that this is the path Toei and Sunrise took. The amount of money that goes into the industry is not static. The original linked article specifically cites cases in which members of the production committee (often toy companies like Good Smile[0]) decided to deliberately take less money because they didn't want their control diluted. They're only able to do this because they can fleece animators into working longer for less money rather than having to get more capital in the project. As for animators having to find new work... good? The current situation is one in which animators pursue their passions, and then have their passions completely take over their life and crush their soul. If they quit en masse, that would be backpressure against productions that want animators to fall on their swords, and production committees that want shit done cheaply. [0] Who, incidentally, funded Hiroyuki Nishimura's[1] buyout of 4chan in exchange for all those J-List ads the site had. [1] Former operator of 2channel who got pushed out in an incredibly sketchy way by his website host.
  - jstarks 3y ago
    > As for animators having to find new work... good? Isn’t this a paternalistic point of view? Why do you know better than the animators who are accepting these jobs? Who are you to tell them that their career choice is wrong?
    - kiba 3y ago
      We have regulations like minimum wages and other labor regulation rules to prevent abuse. Unless you want to say that getting paid a minimum wage paternalistic?
      - smabie 3y ago
        I'd argue yes it is paternalistic, actually
    - johnnyanmac 3y ago
      >Who are you to tell them that their career choice is wrong? I mean, in this scenario they wouldn't get a job, or it'd be an evergreen job that they shouldn't expect to get early in their careers. They wouldn't just laze around if they can't get paid as an animator (especially not in Japanese culture). At best they'd try to be their own entrepreneur and make money that way, while gathering experience for these now-evergreen studios. At worst they give up or try another career. Paternalistic or not, almost every first world country has labor laws precisely so a job can't pay pennies to sustain its business. And governments do that because they don't want income hoarded by the managers and stifling the middle/low class economy.
    - kmeisthax 3y ago
      The animators themselves are saying they hate their working conditions and their dream job has become a nightmare.
      - Ferret7446 3y ago
        Why don't they quit?
ericd 3y ago
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.
numlock86 3y ago
> 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. That is how (modern) society works already on a global scale. I am not saying it's good, but it's the way things are.
- Retric 3y ago
  The worlds economy isn’t underpinned by an underpaid underclass. Every major commodity cobalt, shoes, cellphones etc has large scale automated production. What’s going on is essentially a parallel system where people making almost nothing can barely out complete automation. However, because both are occurring at the same time consumers wouldn’t notice a significant change if 100% of that production was automated. Granted without infrastructure and a skilled workforce you can’t instantly swap to automation, but that’s a different question.
  - chii 3y ago
    > Every major commodity ... etc has large scale automated production. the automate-able industries have done it, leaving behind the ones that aren't as automatable. This is why there's still many developing countries that export cheap labour. You can think of those as the "underpaid" class. Not necessarily bad, since i believe they are not being forced under lock and chain in slavery. They are merely economically incentivized.
    - Retric 3y ago
      I don’t think there are low value non automate-able industries right now. Try and name some. That’s not to say nobody is making subsistence wages making shoes, just that there’s robots making shoes in another factory. It may not be 1:1 in every niche as a train isn’t a drop in replacement for a long haul trucker, but they are still in competition.
ekianjo 3y ago
First, there is no such thing as a "fair pay". All of it is driven by demand and supply, always, except when regulations or external factors somehow break things. Second, of course increased costs of production lead to consequences for end users or people who buy the content. We see that all of the time in every industry.
- Arainach 3y ago
  Businesses do not have an inherent right to exist. If you can't pay a living wage, comply with regulations, and be profitable, your business model is not valid and your business should fail and close. Predictions of dire consequences rarely pan out. Fast food employees in Seattle are earning $15-20/+ per hour and prices did not double - in fact they're not significantly higher than in neighboring counties with lower wages. It turns out that labor costs are only a small fraction of overall costs.
  - imgabe 3y ago
    Employees also do not have a right to any particular career. That's nice that people have a dream to make anime for a living. I hope they get to realize it. But the world does not owe them a particular wage for what they want to do just because it's a job that they want. If you can't make enough money doing a certain job, maybe go get a different job then.
    - Goronmon 3y ago
      I'm not convinced that workers shouldn't have any rights or protections. That sounds like a pretty extreme viewpoint. Or just one coming from an employer's perspective where I can see why you might desire no limits on treatments of workers.
      - ekianjo 3y ago
        [flagged]
        3y ago
jandrese 3y ago
I always like when small business complain that "payroll is the majority of our expenses", but when you look at the expenses it is something like: Income: $100,000/month Expenses: $50,000/month Payroll: Cashier: $290/month Cashier: $290/month Cashier: $290/month Janitor: $290/month Security: $290/month Manager: $1,000/month Owner: $45,000/month "How can I keep my business afloat? We've already cut the staff down to the bare minimum and we're barely getting by!"
- jxf 3y ago
  $290/month? If those cashiers are working 100 hours a month they're making about a third of (US federal) minimum wage.
  - stevenwoo 3y ago
    There’s data comparing EU prices for equal fast food like MacDonalds and the pay for workers and the cost of the final product appears to bear little relationship to worker pay, i.e. corporations crying poor at the usa minimum wage are full of it. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/mcdonalds-workers-denmark/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/mcdonalds-workers-denmark/
  - jandrese 3y ago
    They're working 39.5 hours a week to make sure they aren't in danger of getting benefits.
- crazygringo 3y ago
  That isn't remotely the type of breakdown of any business I've never seen. Not even close. I understand the point you're trying to make, but you'd be better off using real numbers to do it. I've never come across a business owner taking 45% of total income. Competition ensures those kinds of profit levels generally don't exist.
charlieyu1 3y ago
People do like their work and would rather be paid less than to see the industry fold.
threatofrain 3y ago
No, if anything, the above comment is saying the opposite by advocating the bitter but moral vision of a smaller economy with fewer seats, and in this case less anime. We can say that the anime might be better, and that maybe the anime which dies is shitty anyway so good riddance, but we can also say that we're envisioning a smaller economy with fewer artists and less art. Similarly, maybe we should have fewer musicians and less music, but at least we have an absence of the slave economy you mention. Maybe the medical profession is doing something right by limiting the flow of the pipeline.

cmdli 3y ago

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.

kmeisthax 3y ago
Vocational awe is a curse. If you have an endless supply of people willing to work pennies then the industry will build itself around paying them pennies. This does not mean that this is the only way you can build an animation industry - just that this is the path Toei and Sunrise took. The amount of money that goes into the industry is not static. The original linked article specifically cites cases in which members of the production committee (often toy companies like Good Smile[0]) decided to deliberately take less money because they didn't want their control diluted. They're only able to do this because they can fleece animators into working longer for less money rather than having to get more capital in the project. As for animators having to find new work... good? The current situation is one in which animators pursue their passions, and then have their passions completely take over their life and crush their soul. If they quit en masse, that would be backpressure against productions that want animators to fall on their swords, and production committees that want shit done cheaply. [0] Who, incidentally, funded Hiroyuki Nishimura's[1] buyout of 4chan in exchange for all those J-List ads the site had. [1] Former operator of 2channel who got pushed out in an incredibly sketchy way by his website host.
- jstarks 3y ago
  > As for animators having to find new work... good? Isn’t this a paternalistic point of view? Why do you know better than the animators who are accepting these jobs? Who are you to tell them that their career choice is wrong?
  - kiba 3y ago
    We have regulations like minimum wages and other labor regulation rules to prevent abuse. Unless you want to say that getting paid a minimum wage paternalistic?
    - smabie 3y ago
      I'd argue yes it is paternalistic, actually
  - johnnyanmac 3y ago
    >Who are you to tell them that their career choice is wrong? I mean, in this scenario they wouldn't get a job, or it'd be an evergreen job that they shouldn't expect to get early in their careers. They wouldn't just laze around if they can't get paid as an animator (especially not in Japanese culture). At best they'd try to be their own entrepreneur and make money that way, while gathering experience for these now-evergreen studios. At worst they give up or try another career. Paternalistic or not, almost every first world country has labor laws precisely so a job can't pay pennies to sustain its business. And governments do that because they don't want income hoarded by the managers and stifling the middle/low class economy.
  - kmeisthax 3y ago
    The animators themselves are saying they hate their working conditions and their dream job has become a nightmare.
    - Ferret7446 3y ago
      Why don't they quit?

ericd 3y ago

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.

numlock86 3y ago

> 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. That is how (modern) society works already on a global scale. I am not saying it's good, but it's the way things are.

Retric 3y ago
The worlds economy isn’t underpinned by an underpaid underclass. Every major commodity cobalt, shoes, cellphones etc has large scale automated production. What’s going on is essentially a parallel system where people making almost nothing can barely out complete automation. However, because both are occurring at the same time consumers wouldn’t notice a significant change if 100% of that production was automated. Granted without infrastructure and a skilled workforce you can’t instantly swap to automation, but that’s a different question.
- chii 3y ago
  > Every major commodity ... etc has large scale automated production. the automate-able industries have done it, leaving behind the ones that aren't as automatable. This is why there's still many developing countries that export cheap labour. You can think of those as the "underpaid" class. Not necessarily bad, since i believe they are not being forced under lock and chain in slavery. They are merely economically incentivized.
  - Retric 3y ago
    I don’t think there are low value non automate-able industries right now. Try and name some. That’s not to say nobody is making subsistence wages making shoes, just that there’s robots making shoes in another factory. It may not be 1:1 in every niche as a train isn’t a drop in replacement for a long haul trucker, but they are still in competition.

ekianjo 3y ago

First, there is no such thing as a "fair pay". All of it is driven by demand and supply, always, except when regulations or external factors somehow break things. Second, of course increased costs of production lead to consequences for end users or people who buy the content. We see that all of the time in every industry.

Arainach 3y ago
Businesses do not have an inherent right to exist. If you can't pay a living wage, comply with regulations, and be profitable, your business model is not valid and your business should fail and close. Predictions of dire consequences rarely pan out. Fast food employees in Seattle are earning $15-20/+ per hour and prices did not double - in fact they're not significantly higher than in neighboring counties with lower wages. It turns out that labor costs are only a small fraction of overall costs.
- imgabe 3y ago
  Employees also do not have a right to any particular career. That's nice that people have a dream to make anime for a living. I hope they get to realize it. But the world does not owe them a particular wage for what they want to do just because it's a job that they want. If you can't make enough money doing a certain job, maybe go get a different job then.
  - Goronmon 3y ago
    I'm not convinced that workers shouldn't have any rights or protections. That sounds like a pretty extreme viewpoint. Or just one coming from an employer's perspective where I can see why you might desire no limits on treatments of workers.
    - ekianjo 3y ago
      [flagged]
      - 3y ago

jandrese 3y ago

I always like when small business complain that "payroll is the majority of our expenses", but when you look at the expenses it is something like: Income: $100,000/month Expenses: $50,000/month Payroll: Cashier: $290/month Cashier: $290/month Cashier: $290/month Janitor: $290/month Security: $290/month Manager: $1,000/month Owner: $45,000/month "How can I keep my business afloat? We've already cut the staff down to the bare minimum and we're barely getting by!"

jxf 3y ago
$290/month? If those cashiers are working 100 hours a month they're making about a third of (US federal) minimum wage.
- stevenwoo 3y ago
  There’s data comparing EU prices for equal fast food like MacDonalds and the pay for workers and the cost of the final product appears to bear little relationship to worker pay, i.e. corporations crying poor at the usa minimum wage are full of it. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/mcdonalds-workers-denmark/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/mcdonalds-workers-denmark/
- jandrese 3y ago
  They're working 39.5 hours a week to make sure they aren't in danger of getting benefits.
crazygringo 3y ago
That isn't remotely the type of breakdown of any business I've never seen. Not even close. I understand the point you're trying to make, but you'd be better off using real numbers to do it. I've never come across a business owner taking 45% of total income. Competition ensures those kinds of profit levels generally don't exist.

charlieyu1 3y ago

People do like their work and would rather be paid less than to see the industry fold.

threatofrain 3y ago

No, if anything, the above comment is saying the opposite by advocating the bitter but moral vision of a smaller economy with fewer seats, and in this case less anime. We can say that the anime might be better, and that maybe the anime which dies is shitty anyway so good riddance, but we can also say that we're envisioning a smaller economy with fewer artists and less art. Similarly, maybe we should have fewer musicians and less music, but at least we have an absence of the slave economy you mention. Maybe the medical profession is doing something right by limiting the flow of the pipeline.