Forum - View topicINTEREST: Director Osamu Yamasaki Discusses Anime Industry's Working Conditions
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AJ (LordNikon)
 Posts: 504 Location: Kyoto |
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While, I applaud ANN for its advocacy work on this issue, animators are working these first few years as a entry-level job. People fail to realize, that learning the skill of animation is only part of the larger picture when it comes to learning to develop a new skill set. It's not just about learning to perform the task, but the social and professional growth that comes from the experience which is used to move up the ladder whether it is moving on up the ladder in anime, or laterally transferring those newly learned skills to other industries.
The market pays what it is willing to bear. In this case, entry-level animation jobs such as in-betweens has a low barrier of entry, and a glut of people to ready to apply and willing to work for less jsut to do it. This is going to keep wages stagnant. Everyone can shout and demand better pay, but let's be honest, it doesn't often happen in the west, and even less likely to in the east. Even if everyone scales up the cost of a DVD let's say from ¥3000 to ¥4000, that extra money will stay on the top of the tree and be written off of profit or growth, while the lower branches will stay neatly trimmed. This does not hold true for just the entertainment industry, but anything related to the creative fields, whether it is for writers, graphic artists and the like.
Completely and utterly untrue. EVERY job and craft has transferable skills. Examples, time management, critical thinking, ability to solve problems on your feet. You would be amazed how easy skills transfer. Being able to hand draw a cell for instant can easily be transferred to any number of of tasks or functions in completely unrelated industries. |
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mangamuscle
Posts: 2658 Location: Mexico |
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This statement is quite misleading, look at this age chart for japan (taken from here): 
The reason most animator are 40+ years old is because most people nowadays in japan are in that age range (due to a low birth rate), so this is is a problem for any business that needs human workers. Sooner or later they will need to outsource (because their is not enough local labor) or they will need to relax their foreign worker visa laws. |
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Yorl
Posts: 9 |
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According to your graph the 45-59 age group is significantly smaller than neighboring cohorts. Don't think it means what you think it means. |
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mangamuscle
Posts: 2658 Location: Mexico |
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First and foremost, why 45-59? Now lets compare 40-59 to 20-39 (male): 4.8+4.5+3.8+3.8 vs 3.1+3.3+3.8+4.1 16.9 vs 14.3 You can't expect me to think seriously to add the 0-19 bracket population to rhe under 40 workers bracket. You might argue that people age 18 and 19 might be working already, but I would then argue that some people 60+ are still working (Miyazaki is not the only one feed up by so called retirement) and the article states that only 1 in 10 of new animators will not shift to another industry. It is clear that this is a time ticking bomb (unless japanese people continue working well into their 70s) |
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Mrmanga17
Posts: 2 |
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The fact that publishers like Shueisha/Kodansha etc. are basically just using the studios to make advertisement(because that's what anime is actually) of their source material just sucks. The studios themselves only get a budget to work with, which they use to pay their staff and other expenses. To make a profit they have to rely on their Bluray and DVD sales to actually support themselves. So when they make their own work, it's usually a big gamble because if it fails, all the money they got from their previous sales is wasted. |
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Ashen Phoenix
 Posts: 2918 |
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Agreed. Some of the most artistically inspired visuals I've seen in my young life have come from anime, and individual sakuga or otherwise creatively-drawn pieces still stick in my mind today. It's downright heartbreaking to hear these unbelievably talented people have to live off so little when they put so much blood, sweat, and tears into their work. I hope we see this change for the better. |
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CooperRC
Posts: 22 |
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Sound like more and more anime is going to be all computer graphics in the near future. It might all be that way soon. |
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Jose Cruz
 Posts: 1781 Location: South America |
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Well, its the fact people are willing to work for these poor wages that allows Japan to produce 200 animated series per year on a much smaller market than the US who produces about 120 TV shows of all types per year. People are willing to do that for their love for animation.
So animation in Japan is becoming like a religion: as thousands of people sacrifice years of their lives for the god of animation. If wages increased more people would be willing to work as animators and the industry would be glutted. Essentially we are at a low wage equilibrium because people are willing to do it. Anyway, I spent 3 years without real income from the ages of 22 to 25 working on a master's degree. Working as animator is similar: you do it for the experience and the prospects of getting a higher paid job in the industry later, the average annual wages of the animation industry in Japan are around 35,000 dollars (in PPP) since these inbetweeners get much less than that it means the higher ups get more. So wages for the experienced professionals are decent. |
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MiloTheFirst
Posts: 429 |
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At the end of the day it seems to come down to the animators lacking the guts to form a union or the self-respect to demand themselves not to take a job with poor work conditions. I know the possibility of being replaced for some one less demanding is very real, but they are no martir, all workers from all industries have been there at some point in time. they have to stand their ground and demand proper compensation and working conditions, otherwise they have only themselves to blame
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reanimator
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Japanese animators did formed union that back 60's and 70's. People like Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata were involved it. Union didn't worked out because the union was allowed within company, but not industry-wide. Eventually union members died out and replaced by contractors. The underlying problem I see is how much money is raised and distributed for production. Animation production companies always get short end of the stick and they have to share that small pie with numerous subcontractors who have their own overhead costs. That affects everyone down the totem pole and ultimately entry level animators in some subcontract studio. Union or not, it's the outdated and risk aversive business practice is choking life out from the young. Or I would like say, Japan likes to eat young ones so that they could keep aged ones alive. |
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Kadmos1
 Posts: 13583 Location: In Phoenix but has an 85308 ZIP |
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I recall seeing in previous ANN threads about these type of stories that Ghibli and KyoAni have better pay/working conditions. Problem with the former is I think they are in a financial crunch and currently not very active.
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Afezeria
 Posts: 817 Location: Malaysia, Kuantan. |
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mbanu
 Posts: 159 |
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There aren't really any alternative business models to look for... The only reason American animators are well-paid is because they contract out most of the actual animation to studios in other countries willing to work for less. So they'd have to come up with something completely original. |
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WeebForLife
Posts: 4 |
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While I do get that directors' names can sell an anime title, I feel like people forget that the animators do 90% of the work. Without them, there would be nothing to sell. Once they get fed up with this overworked/under-payed system, anime will actually be in a real crisis.
I wonder how much anime get from advertisements, product placement, etc.? Isn't that how U.S. shows get a majority of their budget? |
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Afezeria
Posts: 817 Location: Malaysia, Kuantan. |
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This poor working condition had been discussed and happened for such a long time, even back in the 70s. If the animators decided to put up a revolt, they've should just leave the industry altogether or done it a long time ago. |
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