President’s Message

The American
Federation of Musicians and Employers’ Pension Fund (Fund) has faced financial
difficulties since the global 2007-2008 recession. Similar to dozens of other
pension plans, the Fund is now underfunded and will be unable to pay benefits
at the level projected in the pre-recession financial market. The Fund’s
history of financial struggles is available here. The Fund is in the process of
evaluating various options to reduce a portion of participants’ benefits in
order to remain financially solvent.

As this column is being written, the first leadership training and organizing committee development sessions are concluding at Local 47 (Los Angeles, CA) in preparation for an IEB-supported, Federation-wide, member-driven campaign to win industry-standard wages, residual payments, and benefits for musicians who perform and record TV and film content made for streaming platforms. The campaign also seeks to establish meaningful new revenue from film and TV streaming that would boost contributions toward our pension fund.

On March 18, after a week of intense negotiations, an agreement was
reached with major Hollywood film producers and their television film
counterparts to extend the existing Theatrical and Motion Picture Film
agreements until November 14, 2019, with a 2% increase in wages. As was agreed
one year ago, the parties deemed a short-term contract solution as the better
alternative to the existing deadlock resulting from the producers’ failure to
adequately address the Federation’s goal of creating residual payments for
films and content made originally for streaming platforms.

Below are my remarks from a rally hosted by Local 47 (Los Angeles, CA) immediately prior to our negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and TV Producers toward a successor film agreement.

Good morning, brothers and sisters. I’m proud to be here with my colleagues from the AFM International Executive Board, AFM staff, Local 47 (Los Angeles, CA) officers and staff, members of our sister union SAG-AFTRA, the good folks from the LA County Federation of Labor, but most importantly, great musicians, members of the American Federation of Musicians of the United States and Canada—the oldest and largest labor union in the world representing professional musicians.

If you’ve been
following the status of the American Federation of Musicians and Employers’
Pension Fund (AFM-EPF), you know it has been facing severe funding problems
since the Great Recession, despite earning relatively good investment returns
since then and receiving a significant contribution increase. As detailed more
below, however, these have not been enough to “right the ship.” As a result,
the trustees are preparing for a critical and declining certification in the
spring and an application to the Treasury Department under the 2014 federal law
known as “MPRA” for approval to reduce benefits to the extent necessary to
remain solvent for the next 30 years.