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You're listening to How to Bea.

You're listening to How to Be a Better human. I'm your host Chris Duffy. Of the many strange things about being a comedian, one of the biggest is how being paid works. I can perform the exact same jokes and get paid wildly different amounts.

Sometimes I go to a conference and I tell my jokes and I get a very lucrative check.

Other times I tell those same jokes at a bar and they give me two free-seltors. It's the Wild West out there when it comes to joke prices.

So when I got my first TV writing job I was really surprised to learn that I was now part of a small but

powerful union called the Writers Guild of America. All of a small but powerful union called the Writers Guild of America.

All of a sudden, my work included things like minimum weekly rates,

health care contributions, a potential pension down the road,

and rules about how I could be treated by my bosses. It was

honestly shocking to me. The contrast between how much better I was treated all of a

sudden, it was night and day. And also here's a funny little side note when I moved

to LA I talked to one of the labor

organizers at the union and he told me that the zip code that I had moved into has the

densest concentration of unionized comedians in the world. So there are people on all sides of me having a similar revelation right now.

Being in a union and seeing the power and the benefits, it's really changed how I think about

organizing and community power.

Because the only reason that the Writers Guild is strong

is because the members are willing to stand together

and risk losing out on money and work to protect each other.

Whether you are an established TV writer who is already well into their career or

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