The Union Way

Union Gig...or not?

  Union  Nonunion
Wages  $100 $100 
 Pension Return*  $75   $0
Recorded for broadcast** $385 $0
Less Expenses:     
Union Dues $3  $0
Collections when stiffed***   $0  $37
Total   $557 $63

*Based on life expectancy of 80 years

**Based on 1-hour variety show TV broadcast

***Based on Dunn & Bradstreet collections letters

Don’t Sign those Waivers!

You’ve been hired to play a gig. They want to record the performance and ask you to sign a waiver...Call the Local before you sign!

The Local has many different recording contracts at its disposal and will help to find a way to make the project legitimate under an AFM contract. Call us and let us do the work...we’ll protect your anonymity.

Protect Your Interests

Once you sign a waiver, you have no control over what might happen to your product. You might not object to an archival recording, but six months later you may hear yourself in a Publix commercial...an AFM contract would protect you from a use other than the original use intended. And rates are as low as $40/hour, so rates are reasonable for even the smallest project.

It Can Be Done

Recently, the Local convinced the Pink Church in Pompano Beach to “do the right thing” and sign a local engagement and limited pressing agreement. The church can record a concert and sell up to ten thousand copies of it for only slightly more money than they were originally intending to pay musicians. And the musicians will get pension contributions and protection from misuse of the recording.

It’s a win-win situation for everyone. Call us!


Scales...Holding the Line or a Race to the Bottom?

One of the current issues against the Free Trade Area of the Americas centers on the lack of protection against jobs being exported to countries with the cheapest labor. The pressure businesses put on workers with the threat of moving operations overseas in search of lower wages erodes workers’ bargaining power...the lower wages pull the wages of the higher-paid workers down just by the threat of moving operations.

Musicians, like other service workers, are lucky in that their services are not exportable (with the exception of recording work, which is another story…see Legislative Roundup on page 2). Musicians need to be where the audience is. However, the threat of local musicians underbidding other musicians is just as real as the threat of exporting factory jobs to third world countries.

That is where wage scales come in. Local 655’s scales, established by members, set the bottom line that we agree not to go below. If everyone abides by these scales, instead of fighting each other to see who will work for the least merely to get the gig, we can pressure employers to pay us what we’re worth. Let’s work together to make things better for all...insist on playing for no less than union scale.

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