SAG-AFTRA Contract Includes Controversial Merger of Pension Funds

The SAG-AFTRA board on Monday approved its four-year contract with the major studios, which includes a plan to merge the union’s two pension funds on Jan. 1, 2028.

The deal now goes to the membership for a ratification vote.

The pension merger has been a source of internal friction in the past. The Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists combined into one union in 2012, and the health plans merged in 2017, but the pension systems have remained separate.

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Some beneficiaries of the SAG pension plan have warned that merging with AFTRA will weaken the fund.

“It’s a bailout,” said Peter Antico, a former candidate for secretary-treasurer who has already lodged a complaint about it with the Department of Labor. “It’s very detrimental to SAG and it bails out AFTRA’s retirement fund.”

An argument in favor of the merger is that some members earn income attributable to both plans, but not enough to qualify for pension credits in either one. Those “split earnings” will now be joined into one system, making some eligible for benefits who were not before.

Concerns about the effects of merging both the health and pension funds was a key source of opposition to the merger of the two unions in 2011.

The contract also includes terms on artificial intelligence and streaming residuals.

SAG-AFTRA negotiators reached a deal on May 3 after six weeks of bargaining with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.

The AMPTP previously reached a deal with the Writers Guild of America, which was ratified on April 24 with 90% voting in favor. The WGA deal included a significant bailout of the union’s health fund, which had lost $200 million in the past four years, as well as cutbacks in health benefits.

The Directors Guild of America sat down Monday with the AMPTP to begin its round of negotiations, which are expected to last through early June.

The AMPTP has been keen to avoid a repeat of the 2023 strikes and to bake in a longer period of “labor peace” by securing four-year contracts instead of the traditional three-year terms.