Hollywood unions released a report Monday warning that US film production share has collapsed to 42% from 74% over the last 25 years, as studios shift budgets overseas. The findings, released as Congress weighs a federal production incentive, show television production has slipped even further.
IATSE, the Directors Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA, three of the industry’s most powerful labor organizations, commissioned the report, prepared by consulting firm EY. Television production fell even further: US share dropped from 94% to 64% over 25 years.
What the unions’ report found
The report singles out big-budget films as the biggest driver of the shift. Among the 25 most expensive films tracked, US market share collapsed from 74% to 34% over 25 years, according to the report.
Those 25 films made up just a quarter of all major-studio releases but accounted for half the crew positions and two-thirds of the total budgets. “This highlights that production budgets are heavily concentrated within a small subset of films,” the report’s authors wrote, noting that patterns within this group show a somewhat larger decline than the broader market.
The authors also noted that the overall production pie has grown substantially over 25 years, meaning the US isn’t necessarily producing less in absolute terms, just a shrinking slice of a much bigger industry. They pointed to streaming as a major disruptor of the old math. “The rise of streaming fundamentally altered production scale, budgets, season lengths, and release models, creating discontinuities in what constitutes a comparable television series across periods,” the report states.
What it means for US film and TV workers
The report calculates that if US market share had held steady over 25 years, the country would see an additional $4 billion spent annually on film and TV production domestically.
Members of Congress have largely focused on the recent, sharper downturn in domestic production jobs since the end of the so-called Peak TV era in 2022. The union-backed report takes a longer view, arguing that the globalization of production has been building since 2000, well before streaming’s most recent boom and bust.
The federal incentive under consideration
Congress is considering a federal production incentive worth 20% to 30%, designed to pull work back to American soil. Supporters argue the US needs a national-level response to compete with tax credits offered by Canada, the United Kingdom and other countries, saying state subsidies alone have failed to reverse the trend.
What’s next for US film production
Congress has not yet voted on the proposed federal incentive, and no timeline for a decision has been announced. The union coalition’s report is expected to factor into ongoing lobbying efforts as lawmakers weigh whether a national tax credit can meaningfully reverse 25 years of production moving overseas.
Reporting from Variety contributed to this story.
