unions Great Depression studios movie studio Hollywood
While the role of labor in America has waned in many parts of the country, the unions have maintained a firm grip in Hollywood since their start during Great Depression when workers would line up outside the thriving movie studios looking for the only job in town. Terrible conditions awaited those workers as the studios exploited the eager workforce with meager pay and the ever present threat of the hundreds of others waiting just outside the gates to take their place if they voiced any complaints.
