Career Advice Is this really what road work is paying now?

brucek

Well-Known Member
I'm not singling out this production company, I just came across the listing and saw the pay rate of $13.75/hr + $150 pd.


Is this really what they expect for a road job? It is BELOW Massachusetts minimum wage. Even as an entry job, when you are on the road the company owns you 24/7 so they should pay you for it. $150/wk per diem - I received $210/wk in 1988!


I understand the excitement and value of experience of a show on the road.....but when ticket prices are the highest in history. I'll just say, in the 80's and 90's I was younger and it was a cash world, unions seemed a lot less important.

Sorry for my rant
Bruce
 
Welcome to the wonderful world of "Non-organized tour Labor" . I wouldn't walk across the street for $13.75/hr.
 
Super weak. Only bonus is if you wanna see the states for free room and board. The money will basically pay for food and fun. BTW that PD is being skimmed off the top. I’m heading to CA in a week and it’s 74$ a day.
 
Yikes!
 
Hard pass.
 
Um. No. Thats not even close to what touring is paying. Touring Broadway is lagging way behind R&R right now... and R&R is taking out green people for 300-500/day. I'm hiring green people at 26/hr for local crew... and I mean GREEN.


Honestly, this posting looks like it is looking for carnies. The only folk lower then stagehands. So, as long as you can prop yourself up on a chair while high on whatever the person running the funhouse gave you... you are hired. And even then... don't matter... they weren't going to pay you anyway.
 
That's disgusting, and not even a legal rate in a few states.
I make more than that weekly wage in 2 days.
 
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The legendary showman, P. T. Barnum supposedly once said "There's a sucker born every minute." *
Then there is the joke about the guy with a broom and shovel following the elephants in the circus parade who doesn't want to give up show business.
*-
 
So is Feld involved in this somehow?
 
The legendary showman, P. T. Barnum supposedly once said "There's a sucker born every minute." *
Then there is the joke about the guy with a broom and shovel following the elephants in the circus parade who doesn't want to give up show business.
*-
Hey....in High School marching band, we marched behind the elephants at Circus World. It was motivation to memorize the music so you could look down at your feet when you marched...and not the music.
 
A little late to the game, but touring pays garbage money these days. Truthfully, for those saying that's what you get with non-union tour - the PD isn't as good but the hourly is actually better than a union tour! It's why I've gotten off the road and have transitioned into corporate fly-out work.

The S and M contracts are what most new folks would be working under, and while the job post in question doesn't have benefits they'd be making $860/week in base salary assuming a 55 hour week as indicated in the post.

A typical week on an S contract would see a show moving between 4 and 6 times. Assuming every one-nighter is an 18 hour day we're talking a roughly 90 hour week for the average one-nighter tour if it moved 4 times in a week (assuming a one-nighter is an 8am-2am day, the sit-down day is an 8am-10pm day, and the load-out day is a 2 show day going until 2am) which means the average breakdown is $7.50 per hour. You almost never hit OT penalties on the S and the M contract. L contract has better OT protections and the Full-League contract is great to tour one-nighters under.

Looking at the Networks/Troika/Worklight contract (IATSE Non-League) - these numbers were the numbers from the 2021 agreement which carried thru the restart based on the 2019 levels. I understand they are currently in re-negotiation.

S: $676 minimum for Heads of Department / $562 for Assistants - $65/day Per-Diem - $20/week Pension - $192/week Insurance - 2% weekly salary annuity
M: $820 minimum for Heads of Department / $711 for Assistants - $65/day Per-Diem - $40/week Pension - $249/week Insurance - $42/week annuity
L: $1240 minimum for Heads of Department / $1122 for Assistants - $142/day Per-Diem High Cities $136/day Per-Diem Low Cities - $58.45 vacation fund
and the Broadway League/Full Pink (which covers touring and pinks on Broadway)
$1,277 for Heads of Department / $1,156 for Assistants - $142/day Per-Diem High Cities $136/day Per-Diem Low Cities - $80/week in Pension - $396/ week insurance - 12.5% weekly salary annuity - $58.45/week vacation fund

A note, these are all contractual minimums, most of the producers won't offer below $850 on the S and the M and typically $1,400 on the L. The full's are moving up to >$2k a week. You can see it's all exploitative and pretty awful. In 2011 my first union tour was an S and I was paid $850/week with $36/day in per-diem. In 2021 when the restarts were happening Networks was offering a blanket $850/week to everyone on the S and M, and $1240 on the L. They had massive attrition due to low rates and the truly awful working conditions.
 
A little late to the game, but touring pays garbage money these days. Truthfully, for those saying that's what you get with non-union tour - the PD isn't as good but the hourly is actually better than a union tour! It's why I've gotten off the road and have transitioned into corporate fly-out work.

The S and M contracts are what most new folks would be working under, and while the job post in question doesn't have benefits they'd be making $860/week in base salary assuming a 55 hour week as indicated in the post.

A typical week on an S contract would see a show moving between 4 and 6 times. Assuming every one-nighter is an 18 hour day we're talking a roughly 90 hour week for the average one-nighter tour if it moved 4 times in a week (assuming a one-nighter is an 8am-2am day, the sit-down day is an 8am-10pm day, and the load-out day is a 2 show day going until 2am) which means the average breakdown is $7.50 per hour. You almost never hit OT penalties on the S and the M contract. L contract has better OT protections and the Full-League contract is great to tour one-nighters under.

Looking at the Networks/Troika/Worklight contract (IATSE Non-League) - these numbers were the numbers from the 2021 agreement which carried thru the restart based on the 2019 levels. I understand they are currently in re-negotiation.

S: $676 minimum for Heads of Department / $562 for Assistants - $65/day Per-Diem - $20/week Pension - $192/week Insurance - 2% weekly salary annuity
M: $820 minimum for Heads of Department / $711 for Assistants - $65/day Per-Diem - $40/week Pension - $249/week Insurance - $42/week annuity
L: $1240 minimum for Heads of Department / $1122 for Assistants - $142/day Per-Diem High Cities $136/day Per-Diem Low Cities - $58.45 vacation fund
and the Broadway League/Full Pink (which covers touring and pinks on Broadway)
$1,277 for Heads of Department / $1,156 for Assistants - $142/day Per-Diem High Cities $136/day Per-Diem Low Cities - $80/week in Pension - $396/ week insurance - 12.5% weekly salary annuity - $58.45/week vacation fund

A note, these are all contractual minimums, most of the producers won't offer below $850 on the S and the M and typically $1,400 on the L. The full's are moving up to >$2k a week. You can see it's all exploitative and pretty awful. In 2011 my first union tour was an S and I was paid $850/week with $36/day in per-diem. In 2021 when the restarts were happening Networks was offering a blanket $850/week to everyone on the S and M, and $1240 on the L. They had massive attrition due to low rates and the truly awful working conditions.

And AEA is way behind too. All my broadway touring friends are rather salty right now... and I keep telling them to jump ship and start concert touring. Concert touring actually feeds you... actually houses you.... no Smuesdays.... and you get bus food. Plus, no 12 hour outs! Seriously. If the show isn't gone 2 hours after the audience leaves I start getting itchy.
 
And AEA is way behind too. All my broadway touring friends are rather salty right now... and I keep telling them to jump ship and start concert touring. Concert touring actually feeds you... actually houses you.... no Smuesdays.... and you get bus food. Plus, no 12 hour outs! Seriously. If the show isn't gone 2 hours after the audience leaves I start getting itchy.
Benefits on the other hand...
 
Benefits on the other hand...

Early in his career, Garth Brooks put his crew on retainer so they'd be available when he needed them between tours, and he also had health care and other benefits. Not sure what the status of all that is these days, but I think it's important to remember that his college major was business, not music.

An example of the culture clash between music touring and family entertainment/theatre was borne out when Feld started with family arena shows that were not circuses or ice shows. Very "rock and roll" and Feld management seemed surprised that people from that background demanded transportation ("what do you mean I should drive my own vehicle and charge other crew to ride along?").

There were other conflicts that seem to have been worked out, but music touring pays better, treats staff better, and the show goes into most venues the same way making safety easier and the result more consistent for fans.
 
There were other conflicts that seem to have been worked out, but music touring pays better, treats staff better, and the show goes into most venues the same way making safety easier and the result more consistent for fans.

It's why I do the work I do now. I'm paid for my travel days (you're not on a Broadway tour unless you're wardrobe), per-diems are better, my hotels are better, I typically get a solo rental car or I share with only one other person so my days off are spent better) but a lot of theater people really hold a mentality that this sort of work is beneath them. I still do work on Broadway to make insurance, but three days of corporate work at the level I'm working at pays the same as mixing a musical for a week on Broadway. Two days of corporate work pays the same as a week of being a design assistant on Broadway (which should show you how bad Broadway pays these days).

As for concert touring - the grass isn't always greener. I'm a little in that world too and there is a lot of wage abuse. If you're working direct for the artist they tend to want to pay all of their staff as contractors and not employees. Explaining that yes, I would like to be covered under workers compensation because I don't walk into an arena or cross an international border without protections and don't carry PLI took a bit of explaining and the concert touring folks really really love this model and no amount of explaining that no, you can't write off every single meal on your taxes if you were a contractor AND you got per-diem will change their minds. How many tools do you really buy in a year once your kit is established that write-offs actually make an appreciable difference when compared to the 7.1% self-employment taxes you'd be losing? That industry absolutely LOVES being illegally classified as contractors.

It's also somewhat become a race to the bottom with wages for those working for the huge rental shops - especially for the younger folks breaking into the industry. Sure you get catering and nice hotel rooms and the conditions are somewhat less abusive but at the end of the day these folks are making $350/day for their work days and 1/2 pay on travel which means most of them aren't cracking $2k a week for a 5 day week with 1 travel day, 1 day off, and sleeper busses the rest of the time. It's good money for the folks starting out in their careers compared to theater touring but if they hit a career ceiling the pay is comparatively low. In musical theater touring at least if you hit a career ceiling after a few years you'll have about the same pay as someone working for a large rock shop but also have pension, annuity, and insurance.

Long story short - most touring models have become predatory and exploit folks passion for this business to feed more increasingly demanding productions
 
Benefits on the other hand...

There are bands out there that do them... and if you are being paid out the nose you can buy them way easier then it used to be. There is also the work for a shop that sends you out option. (SAVI is looking for 2 lighting people right now with full benefits.......)
 
There are bands out there that do them... and if you are being paid out the nose you can buy them way easier then it used to be. There is also the work for a shop that sends you out option. (SAVI is looking for 2 lighting people right now with full benefits.......)
It really becomes apples, oranges, and pineapples at some point to try and generally compare industries. In my current situation, after OT I'm grossing ~4K a week in salary with union benefits, three days a week where I work no more than a single show, and (barring covid consuming our swings) one day completely off each week. Oh, and two months of banked future benefits for every month of benefits i'm paying for currently. I have plenty of gripes about the conditions of contracts and what the minimums guarantee, but I also think that comparing minimums to the (non existant) minimums in R+R/Corporate is a bit ingenious. All it takes is pointing at one or more of the dance competitions that go through your venue to make a nice counter argument :)
 

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