Animation Guild on DreamWorks Win and ILEPI on the Union Membership Surge

Two conversations capturing what the union movement looks like right now — one tracing how remote animation workers at DreamWorks won their first collective bargaining agreement and one showing what the national data says about where the labor movement is headed.

Animation Guild TAG Local 839 IATSE field rep Mairghread Scott and DreamWorks character rigger and negotiating committee member JJ Jay discuss the first collective bargaining agreement covering DreamWorks remote workers, ratified August 21, 2026 with 97% in favor and 83% turnout. The contract delivers free single healthcare coverage through the Motion Picture Industry plan with a family cap of $50 per month regardless of family size, a 52% wage increase for the lowest-paid workers, an end to the practice of paying remote workers less based on where they live and an automatic employer retirement contribution of 6% of union base wages requiring no employee contribution. Jay said his personal healthcare savings under the contract amount to approximately $6,900 annually compared to what DreamWorks was offering non-union employees. Scott said the key to getting it done was workers who knew their worth and were willing to stand together.

Then, Illinois Economic Policy Institute economist Frank Manzo discusses the 12th Annual State of the Union Study, produced in coordination with the Project for Middle Class Renewal at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The study found that the United States added more than 411,000 union members last year, the largest one-year surge since 2008, with union membership growing three times faster in states that protect collective bargaining rights than in states with so-called "right-to-work" laws. Workers in so-called "right-to-work" states earn 8% less than their peers in collective bargaining states after adjusting for cost of living, a gap that has widened since 2019. The highest union membership rates nationally are among Black workers, military veterans and workers with advanced degrees. And the Trump administration's attempt to revoke collective bargaining rights from more than one million federal workers drove a surge in public sector organizing that helped push the national total to its highest point in nearly two decades.

Visit animationguild.org for more from the Animation Guild and illinoisepi.org for the full State of the Union Study.