#comicsbrokeme

[superduperman]

Don't know if CBR has covered this but here's an interesting article about the abuses in the comics industry:


https://www.thedailybeast.com/comics...s-worlds-abuse

[Bruce Wayne]

It's basically a race to the bottom in terms of wages. That's why DC/Marvel hires so many artists from places like Brazil/Mexico where you have favorable exchange rates or low cost of living.

edit: Not to mention even with sweatshop conditions they are getting their ass kicked by manga due to distribution/market conditions.

[Frontier]

Sad stuff .

[Midnight_v]

Huh. Maybe the industry is the problem. Direct to customer crowdfunding seems to be the way, cause you who's NOT going broke?

The dudes charging me $50 a graphic novel on indigogo, they're eating on that side. If you're not FORCING a company to pay competitively they won't

[skyvolt2000]

Huh. Maybe the industry is the problem. Direct to customer crowdfunding seems to be the way, cause you who's NOT going broke?

The dudes charging me $50 a graphic novel on indigogo, they're eating on that side. If you're not FORCING a company to pay competitively they won't

But some companies are doing crowdfunding.

Boom Studios, Scout Comics, Archie (sort of) and Dynamite and others pick up crowdfunded books.

And so far it works.

And in some cases that is the only way to get the book.

There is one on kickstarter-Capable that is on issue 7 via crowdfunding and a company picked it up.

While Preview World had it listed to order-a lot of store never saw it listed to order it.

Outside of Midtown Comics-nobody else seems to know the book exists.

At most those stores are removing the middle man (comic book store) and later offering the books to stores after almost everyone who really wanted them already got them via crowdfunding.

[shooshoomanjoe]

Didn't know comics had become a sweatshop. When and why did this happen and why aren't more people talking about it?

[thwhtGuardian]

Didn't know comics had become a sweatshop. When and why did this happen and why aren't more people talking about it?

It always has been, you just have to look at the lives of creators like Joe Shuster, Jerry Siegel, and Jack Kirby who all at times lived in or just above the poverty level. It's the dark side of our hobby, the people who make the stories we love barely make minimum wage and they have to slave away to do it.

[thwhtGuardian]

Huh. Maybe the industry is the problem. Direct to customer crowdfunding seems to be the way, cause you who's NOT going broke?

The dudes charging me $50 a graphic novel on indigogo, they're eating on that side. If you're not FORCING a company to pay competitively they won't

Eh, even that's probably below minimum wage when you break down the time it takes for the artists to draw the whole book. And it still doesn't address the issues of healthcare and retirement.

[shooshoomanjoe]

It always has been, you just have to look at the lives of creators like Joe Shuster, Jerry Siegel, and Jack Kirby who all at times lived in or just above the poverty level. It's the dark side of our hobby, the people who make the stories we love barely make minimum wage and they have to slave away to do it.

Yea but that was decades ago. Artists made a lot of money back in the '90s; Liefeld would even boast that he paid (via high salaries) for his employees' expensive cars. And I know that the '90s but if you look up the net worth of the writers/artists from the '70s and '80s, it's in the millions. It's crazy that creators don't make that much these days.

[thwhtGuardian]

Yea but that was decades ago. Artists made a lot of money back in the '90s; Liefeld would even boast that he paid (via high salaries) for his employees' expensive cars. And I know that the '90s but if you look up the net worth of the writers/artists from the '70s and '80s, it's in the millions. It's crazy that creators don't make that much these days.

That was an anomaly that lasted for a only very brief moment of time and hasn't been repeated since, and even when you look at that particular bright spot, where did it come from? Artists being treated like crap in the years before. And the only reason it worked was because it coincided with the speculator boom and booms can't last forever. This article breaks it down pretty good.

[numberthirty]

Also worth noting that those artists quite literally started their own company based on what they had gone through as employees...

[Kirby101]

Yea but that was decades ago. Artists made a lot of money back in the '90s; Liefeld would even boast that he paid (via high salaries) for his employees' expensive cars. And I know that the '90s but if you look up the net worth of the writers/artists from the '70s and '80s, it's in the millions. It's crazy that creators don't make that much these days.

I know many name artists and writers from them that would disagree with that sentence.

[thwhtGuardian]

I know many name artists and writers from them that would disagree with that sentence.

And the list isn't all that great, the list of artists worth more than a million is pretty small and most of them got their wealth through merchandising or selling the IP to a larger company rather than what they earned from their actual comics.

The truth is we really do take our enjoyment from a product that is based largely on the exploitation of its work force and yet most of us still complain about the cost of an issue.

[Bruce Wayne]

Yea but that was decades ago. Artists made a lot of money back in the '90s; Liefeld would even boast that he paid (via high salaries) for his employees' expensive cars. And I know that the '90s but if you look up the net worth of the writers/artists from the '70s and '80s, it's in the millions. It's crazy that creators don't make that much these days.

That's complete fantasy. Most artists are not Liefeld/Lee/Mcfarlane. For example Dan Raspler before DC fired him in the 2000s apparently had what was basically a jobs program for many artists who werent getting by in that he'd put them on some books he had so that they could get some money. Which just shows you how dire conditions were and continue to be. And we have seen how the MCU and Feige nickles and dimes creators and cheats them out of royalties. Artists and writers are not swimming in money. The fact that so many older creators are just near the poverty level or are suffering stress/health problems/deaths just demonstrates how exploitative the industry is and that it's not some golden meal ticket like you imagine it to be.

[SUPERECWFAN1]

The industry has always had a bad track record with even the greats in the industry with how they were done. Its no shock the practice has continued sadly.