Production Assistants Protest Loss of Guaranteed Hours on Chicago TV Shows

LiUNA Local 724, the union for production assistants on Chicago Med and Chicago Fire, displayed banners and a Scabby the Rat inflatable at two production locations to protest the elimination of previously guaranteed 12- and 14-hour workdays. Those guarantees had allowed assistants to earn overtime in addition to a base wage of $19.93 per hour. After the crews ratified their first contracts in early July while the shows were on hiatus, the hour guarantees vanished, leading to a reported 43 percent drop in weekly pay for some Chicago Fire assistants.

Union business manager Alex Aguilar said the cuts undermine the livelihood of the lowest-paid TV crew members. The union contends that NBCUniversal and Wolf Entertainment cited the expense of a union health plan for the decision and may have violated federal labor law by changing terms without bargaining. Although the guarantees were not written into the new contracts, the union has not yet filed an NLRB unfair-labor-practice charge, while a non-unionized sister show, Chicago P.D., retained its hour guarantees and recently granted a three-percent raise.