{"id":157134,"date":"2026-07-17T06:04:51","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T14:04:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2026\/07\/17\/writers-guild-of-america-also-sues-paramount-citing-looming-merger-layoff-bloodbath\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T06:04:51","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T14:04:51","slug":"writers-guild-of-america-also-sues-paramount-citing-looming-merger-layoff-bloodbath","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2026\/07\/17\/writers-guild-of-america-also-sues-paramount-citing-looming-merger-layoff-bloodbath\/","title":{"rendered":"Writers Guild Of America Also Sues Paramount, Citing Looming Merger Layoff Bloodbath"},"content":{"rendered":"

Not long after twelve states\u00a0sued Paramount<\/a>\u00a0claiming its $111 billion merger with Warner Brothers would harm market competition, the Writers Guild of America (WGA)\u00a0filed their own lawsuit<\/a>, warning that the massive debt load from the media industry\u2019s latest megamerger will result in an ocean of layoffs for an already reeling U.S. entertainment industry.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit notes that the current film industry is dominated by just five players: Disney (ABC), NBCUniversal (Comcast), Sony, Paramount (CBS), and Warner Brothers. Comcast\u00a0recently restructured<\/a>\u00a0to make it easier to sell off its NBC and Universal properties, opening the door to a lot of very quick consolidation in addition to the speedy Skydance\/Paramount\/Warners merger.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith fewer competitors, the merged Paramount-Warner Bros. entity would have both the \u200bincentive and the ability to lower costs by suppressing writers\u2019 wages and reducing output. Writers will be paid less and \u200bhave fewer employment opportunities,\u201d the WGA complaint said.<\/p>\n

Supreme Court precedent (for whatever that\u2019s worth anymore) has long indicated that any merger
yielding a post-merger market share exceeding 30% (which this deal does) is presumptively anticompetitive. The WGA notes that muted competition will result not just in fewer jobs, but lower wages and fewer opportunities for creatives overall across both film and television.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith fewer competitors, the merged Paramount-Warner Bros. entity would have both
the incentive and the ability to lower costs by suppressing writers\u2019 wages and reducing output.
Writers will be paid less and have fewer employment opportunities,\u201d the lawsuit states.<\/p>\n

While Paramount would like to pretend this is a debate, and most U.S. press outlets bury the lede, U.S. history is\u00a0vividly clear on the harms created by media consolidation<\/em>. That was most recently personified by\u00a0AT&T\u2019s disastrous acquisitions of DirecTV and Time Warner<\/a>, which resulted in upward of 50,000 layoffs, higher prices, worse service, and no shortage of shuttered creative projects.<\/p>\n

The rushed acquisitions of both CBS\/Paramount and Warner Brothers \u2014 all so Larry Ellison\u2019s son can play media mogul \u2014 have created a particularly heavy debt load of $79 billion. Such debt is\u00a0always<\/strong>\u00a0paid for by consumers and labor, often in more ways than one.<\/p>\n

Paramount has promised to release 30 theatrical releases per year and to keep them in exclusively for theaters for 45 days, but as I\u2019ve long made clear, pre-merger promises are utterly worthless. Especially in a country dead set on steadily lobotomizing its public interest regulators. As we\u2019ve seen with consolidation in sectors like wireless, America\u2019s favorite pastime is\u00a0pretending to ignore the harms of pointless mergers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This is a pretty clear example of the kind of consolidation that should be blocked for the benefit of labor, markets, and consumers, but despite a lot of rambling pretense about a love of free market competition and entrepreneurial spirit, America consistently fails to walk the\u00a0talk on antitrust<\/a>, the impact of which is abundant and getting exponentially worse under pay-to-play Trumpism.<\/p>\n

Writers Guild Of America Also Sues Paramount, Citing Looming Merger Layoff Bloodbath<\/a><\/p>\n

FCC Officials Took Pricey Gifts From Paramount As The Company Needed Approval For Billion-Dollar Deals<\/a>
Cops Continue To Prove They Can\u2019t Be Trusted With Surveillance Tech<\/a>
To Dodge A Fight With Trump, Law Firms Cut Deals. Now The Deals Are Creating A Fight With Trump.<\/a><\/p>\n

The post Writers Guild Of America Also Sues Paramount, Citing Looming Merger Layoff Bloodbath<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n

Not long after twelve states\u00a0sued Paramount<\/a>\u00a0claiming its $111 billion merger with Warner Brothers would harm market competition, the Writers Guild of America (WGA)\u00a0filed their own lawsuit<\/a>, warning that the massive debt load from the media industry\u2019s latest megamerger will result in an ocean of layoffs for an already reeling U.S. entertainment industry.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit notes that the current film industry is dominated by just five players: Disney (ABC), NBCUniversal (Comcast), Sony, Paramount (CBS), and Warner Brothers. Comcast\u00a0recently restructured<\/a>\u00a0to make it easier to sell off its NBC and Universal properties, opening the door to a lot of very quick consolidation in addition to the speedy Skydance\/Paramount\/Warners merger.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith fewer competitors, the merged Paramount-Warner Bros. entity would have both the \u200bincentive and the ability to lower costs by suppressing writers\u2019 wages and reducing output. Writers will be paid less and \u200bhave fewer employment opportunities,\u201d the WGA complaint said.<\/p>\n

Supreme Court precedent (for whatever that\u2019s worth anymore) has long indicated that any merger
yielding a post-merger market share exceeding 30% (which this deal does) is presumptively anticompetitive. The WGA notes that muted competition will result not just in fewer jobs, but lower wages and fewer opportunities for creatives overall across both film and television.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith fewer competitors, the merged Paramount-Warner Bros. entity would have both
the incentive and the ability to lower costs by suppressing writers\u2019 wages and reducing output.
Writers will be paid less and have fewer employment opportunities,\u201d the lawsuit states.<\/p>\n

While Paramount would like to pretend this is a debate, and most U.S. press outlets bury the lede, U.S. history is\u00a0vividly clear on the harms created by media consolidation<\/em>. That was most recently personified by\u00a0AT&T\u2019s disastrous acquisitions of DirecTV and Time Warner<\/a>, which resulted in upward of 50,000 layoffs, higher prices, worse service, and no shortage of shuttered creative projects.<\/p>\n

The rushed acquisitions of both CBS\/Paramount and Warner Brothers \u2014 all so Larry Ellison\u2019s son can play media mogul \u2014 have created a particularly heavy debt load of $79 billion. Such debt is\u00a0always<\/strong>\u00a0paid for by consumers and labor, often in more ways than one.<\/p>\n

Paramount has promised to release 30 theatrical releases per year and to keep them in exclusively for theaters for 45 days, but as I\u2019ve long made clear, pre-merger promises are utterly worthless. Especially in a country dead set on steadily lobotomizing its public interest regulators. As we\u2019ve seen with consolidation in sectors like wireless, America\u2019s favorite pastime is\u00a0pretending to ignore the harms of pointless mergers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This is a pretty clear example of the kind of consolidation that should be blocked for the benefit of labor, markets, and consumers, but despite a lot of rambling pretense about a love of free market competition and entrepreneurial spirit, America consistently fails to walk the\u00a0talk on antitrust<\/a>, the impact of which is abundant and getting exponentially worse under pay-to-play Trumpism.<\/p>\n

Writers Guild Of America Also Sues Paramount, Citing Looming Merger Layoff Bloodbath<\/a><\/p>\n

FCC Officials Took Pricey Gifts From Paramount As The Company Needed Approval For Billion-Dollar Deals<\/a>
Cops Continue To Prove They Can\u2019t Be Trusted With Surveillance Tech<\/a>
To Dodge A Fight With Trump, Law Firms Cut Deals. Now The Deals Are Creating A Fight With Trump.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Not long after twelve states\u00a0sued Paramount\u00a0claiming its $111 billion merger with Warner Brothers would harm market competition, the Writers Guild of America (WGA)\u00a0filed their own lawsuit, warning that the massive debt load from the media industry\u2019s latest megamerger will result in an ocean of layoffs for an already reeling U.S. entertainment industry. The lawsuit notes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":157135,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-157134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-above_the_law"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/handshake-merger-money-finance-zEv9IL.jpg?fit=688%2C508&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157134"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157134\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157135"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}