A shared reality across borders
Organizing and empowering young workers in the media, entertainment and arts is essential to stop abuse and exploitation that afflicts the sector globally. Precarious employment, low wages, unequal pay, long and irregular working hours, rising living and housing costs, poor mental wellbeing, bullying and harassment are making it harder than ever for young professionals to build sustainable careers in media and entertainment.
Driven by a desire to break into the industry, young workers often accept poor working conditions, long hours, or even unpaid work. Many workers – specifically young women – often leave the sector early on, due to poor working conditions and lack of work-life balance.
Building bridges and growing international solidarity
For the past two years, UNI Media, Entertainment & Arts has been growing its young workers’ global network and created a platform to regularly meet online and in-presence, exchange experiences, identify shared challenges and strengthen international solidarity.
Young workers met for the first time in person in Lisbon in December 2025. This reunion marked an important milestone for UNI Media, Entertainment & Arts’ growing young workers network, as participants came together with a clear purpose: to better understand the realities faced by young workers across the sector and to build collective solutions at international level.
The network reunited again in Dublin in June 2026, jointly with FIA Future Now, the youth network of sister federation, the International Federation of Actors. It was an opportunity to exchange on strategies to organize young workers in the sector, based on ETUC guidelines on Engaging Young People in Trade Unions. Discussions also focused on identifying recommendations towards film schools and educational bodies to better equip future professionals when transitioning from education to the world of work and ensuring safer learning environments.
Promoting safer and more inclusive workplaces for future professionals
Reaching out to young workers and opening conversations with film schools about working conditions and safe, inclusive environments is one way to promote better working conditions in the future. For the first time, UNI brought together film students, unions and industry organizations for a workshop in partnership with the Institute of Arts, Design and Technology of Dun Laoghaire. Held in Dublin in June 2026, the meeting served to equip students and young professionals with the knowledge as well as legal and practical tools to promote better working conditions and equal opportunities in the industry.
UNI Media, Entertainment & Arts young workers lead the way!
Ahead of the UNI Media, Entertainment & Arts General Assembly taking place in Bangkok 2-3 December 2026, young members lay down key priorities for collective union action:
- Improving access to the sector by addressing the realities of entry-level work, including extremely low pay or unpaid work, inadequate training and skills development, and highly precarious working conditions that often force young workers to juggle multiple jobs to make ends meet.
- Strengthening the involvement of young workers in the trade union movement by making unions spaces to learn, organize and fight for workers’ rights, while also developing strategies to reach future workers earlier, including in film and theatre schools and training institutions.
- The urgent need to prioritize mental wellbeing, with a strong focus on combating bullying and harassment that remain widespread across the media, entertainment and arts.
In empowering and advocating for young workers, unions are shaping a movement that is more inclusive, more diverse and more capable of fighting for dignity, equality and safety at work for every worker in the media, entertainment and arts.