Current Events > Anime is booming. So why are animators living in poverty?

(+) Yeah! (+)

The workers who make the Japanese shows the world is binge-watching can earn as little as $200 a month. Many wonder how much longer they can endure it.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/24/business/japan-anime.html

"X is booming. So why are the Workers of X Industry Living in Poverty?" applies to a LOT of things.

And the answer is pretty much always the same: because the people at the top take the lions share of the profits despite doing none of the work.

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Same reason so many video game programming jobs pay little to other programming jobs. Too many people want to work in the video game and anime business.

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Animators make the source material, story, do the voice acting, advertising and promotion, etc.

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Cause they don't go where the money is.

IE: Disturbing rule 34 porn.

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CloneTheHero posted...

you realize the people at the top create the opportunity for the rest in the first place?

???????

Does anime spring into existence spontaneously? Who do you think draws it? Who puts their heart, soul and skill into making these things?

Thi is capitalism's most terrible success: those who do the most receive the least.

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Passion jobs don't pay because there are too many people who want to do it.

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CloneTheHero posted...

nothing wrong with the rich getting richer if its not hurting anybody.

That's the entire point though. The same system that allows capitalists to lie about climate change or encourage wars or utilize literal slavery for profit allows for workers to get the short end of the stick when the product couldn't exist without them.

Pretty much everyone is getting fucked to some degree

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To those saying it can't be done, there are already a couple studios in the industry that pay their animators a decent wage, like KyoAni. The mechanism is there, it would just require the production companies to give up their profits.

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CloneTheHero posted...

i said opportunity not the creative input. youre confused here. nothing wrong with the rich getting richer if its not hurting anybody. you dont suffer because bezos is a muiti billionaire in fact you benefit from the convenience his creation has created. just like you benefit from these anime honchos publishing anime seemingly off a conveyer belt and into your home. im not too well versed in anime but im willing to bet with the advent of streaming services youre now getting more anime than ever before. guess who plays a big part in that? the fat cats looking to meet their quarterlys.

God I fucking hate that people exist that actually think like this

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people licking the boots of billionaires are the biggest fucking losers on this planet

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oversaturation maybe? there's just so much of it out there that the supply overreaches demand

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CloneTheHero posted...

lol. you realize the people at the top create the opportunity for the rest in the first place? not sharing the wealth is pretty douchey but ultimately its their money. if you really hate it so much stop supporting them.

The consumers generate the opportunity by consuming the product. The people at the top don't create or generate anything, they just take a cut of the money that other people's labor generates.

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nfearurspecimn posted...

oversaturation maybe? there's just so much of it out there that the supply overreaches demand

No, no, the only explanation is that those parasites at the top must be stealing away all the money from the hardworking artists. Rise up, art proletariat!

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YellowSUV posted...

Same reason so many video game programming jobs pay little to other programming jobs. Too many people want to work in the video game and anime business.

what does that have to do with how little they are getting paid? Th demand for programmers and other traditional jobs are way higher.

video game industry is more volatile and unregulated

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Shablagoo posted...

And the answer is pretty much always the same: because the people at the top take the lions share of the profits despite doing none of the work.

You ever think of things beginning at the bottom level? Its easy to say I didnt make it as a musician because people at top were cutting profits or because theres an industry that promotes only a couple of select bands but the reality is that Im responsible for myself as an artist to grow and find ways to grow tbh

Hope you dont take that the wrong way, thats just my perspective as an artist

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It's the pay rate that's offered and still accepted.

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yunalenne10 posted...

It's the pay rate that's offered and still accepted.

It's accepted because the animators have wanted to work this job since they were a baby. They're filled with passion and then it's squeezed out of them by high level execs preying on the near endless supply of animators yet to be exploited.

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low skill work with an over-saturated job market where most of the revenue is generated by merchandise surrounding the product rather than the product itself

CloneTheHero posted...

so youre saying anime consumers should be seeing a check in their mail? lmao ok. thatd be nice

If that's what you took from my post than you are an even bigger fucking idiot than I gave you credit for. Which is, in and of itself, quite an impressive feat.

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NinjaWarrior455 posted...

It's accepted because the animators have wanted to work this job since they were a baby. They're filled with passion and then it's squeezed out of them by high level execs preying on the near endless supply of animators yet to be exploited.

Another problem is that the (both video games and anime) industry is not regulated, which means these companies can continue to be pieces of shits to their workers. It's honestly why I argue that there needs to be a union for both industries, but every time I bring this up people usually go "lol" to my post.

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Kaiganeer posted...

low skill work with an over-saturated job market where most of the revenue is generated by merchandise surrounding the product rather than the product itself

>animation
>low skill
though the oversaturation point does stand (plus Japan's work culture where you're expected to devote your entire being to your craft)

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CloneTheHero posted...

im in texas but im not texan. ive been here a few weeks. pretty creepy that you search and store archived posts tho lol. you must be popular with women

lmao

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Of course people would be defending this shit lmao clown world.
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What exactly are most studios profit margins? Unless their making bank on merchandising probabaly not much.

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CloneTheHero posted...

im in texas but im not texan. ive been here a few weeks. pretty creepy that you search and store archived posts tho lol. you must be popular with women

>Active Posts: 667

you are such a fucking loser, its super obvious

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Watch this

https://youtu.be/Tvj-XnVKQI8
https://youtu.be/BowxEMkCgIU
https://youtu.be/oBQqjNf3LwA

The seiyuu get more money than the Animators

That why seiyuu is like really popular compared to dub voice actor
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Cause animators tend to be dumb as shit by virtue of spending all their time drawing instead of learning about taxes.

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Aki_Sora posted...

Watch this

https://youtu.be/Tvj-XnVKQI8
https://youtu.be/BowxEMkCgIU
https://youtu.be/oBQqjNf3LwA

The seiyuu get more money than the Animators

That why seiyuu is like really popular compared to dub voice actor

Unfortunately, they don't get paid as much compared to voice actors for certain shows like the Simpsons: https://soranews24.com/2018/09/19/japanese-twitter-users-shocked-to-learn-how-much-the-simpsons-voice-actors-get-paid/

Old fucks basically taking advantage of people signing up to do this out of passion. Also their extremely outdated monetization strategy for anime makes most of the actual anime viewing earnings go to the syndicate rather than the creators, and animes ultimately make up most of their profit off of selling blu-rays.

It's just doomed. They treat this shit so sacred that nobody's willing to really step up and change the process aside from a few generous and prosperous studios

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Animators, rise up and run a business instead of animatoring

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The simple answer is that because the management can get away with it. Business is typically about increasing revenue & cutting costs. This is basically the state of almost every industry with high cash intake, but relatively low wages, & it's REALLY easy in an industry where you have passionate people who are driven to be in the business, such as animation, comic books, & video games, to the extent they're willing to overlook their own abuse & exploitation as just "the way things are".

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CloneTheHero posted...

so youre saying anime consumers should be seeing a check in their mail? lmao ok. thatd be nice

Thats...not at all what he was saying. He was saying that the owners of the companies serve no function in the economic transaction. Consumers want to watch anime, animators (and everyone else that produces the shows like editors, voice actors, etc.) produce the animes and the consumers pay to watch them. The owners just take the lions share of the profits even though they had no hand in the creation of the product.

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Do people generally pay for anime these days? Outside of streaming platforms I mean
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emblem boy posted...

Do people generally pay for anime these days? Outside of streaming platforms I mean

There are basically two crowds in anime of people who buy it and people that don't. In Japan where it's a sensible price generally, more people buy it.

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If you really want to support anime buy the manga, dvd and blu ray.

The subscription service like funimation and crunchyroll really don't give much money to japan animation because you pay so little money.
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