- Variety: Tensions Rise in Hollywood as Emboldened Writers Guild Renews Negotiations.
A strike would require all 12,000 WGA members to stop work immediately. It would cause an immediate blackout of late-night television programming, followed by delays in programming for the 2017-2018 season and scripted summer shows currently in production.
Sources have indicated that when negotiators last met, the two sides had been closing some of the gaps in the area of adjusting compensation terms for writers working on short-order series. WGA has been seeing lost income and long production timetables for many cable and streaming shows, which produce fewer episodes than the traditional 22- or 24-episode seasons for broadcast network shows.
The two sides are facing complex bargaining over the WGA health plan, which has run a deficit during most of the past few years given the spiraling cost of health care. Producers were believed to be offering to increase contributions by $60 million while the WGA was asking for around $80 million to $85 million.