Abigail Disney, right, during 2019 testimony before the House Financial Services Committee. Courtesy Fork Films
Author: To read Peter Hong's article, please click here.
The granddaughter of Disney’s co-founder imagines a more equitable America, starting with better pay for Disney park workers.
When Abigail Disney was growing up in Los Angeles, she was told never to publicly disparage her family business. Her grandfather, Roy O. Disney, founded the company with his brother Walt. She followed those instructions for most of her life, but in 2018, she opened a Facebook message from a Disneyland worker pleading with her to visit him and his fellow cast members, as Disney calls its park employees, to hear their stories. When she got to Anaheim, she was so struck by their hardships that she decided to make a documentary film, The American Dream and Other Fairy Tales. Through the stories of Disneyland cast members and of her own family, Disney (a philanthropist who previously made several other documentaries) explores how and why today’s political and economic system keeps workers in poverty while enriching executives — both to levels unthinkable a generation ago.
In one scene Disney is shown sitting in a circle with a group of Disney workers. “How many of you know someone who has slept in their car in the last year?” she asks. Hands go up. “How many know somebody who has gone without medical care because they can’t afford it?” More hands.
Later, she is shown testifying before a congressional committee, saying, “Disney could raise the salary of all of its workers to a living wage. It was possible to do this when my grandfather and great-uncle built the company, it’s possible now.” Committee members immediately tell her “that is socialism” and call her a Marxist.
Disney emphasizes that she is merely calling for the kind of economic balance that existed during her childhood. Her film notes that as Disney CEO her grandfather earned about 80 times the salary of the average Disney worker. Bob Iger, Disney CEO when she filmed the documentary, was paid about 1,400 times the average Disney worker salary
You state in The American Dreamthat after you sent an email to Bob Iger, he responded saying he understood the hardship of the workers, but put more of the responsibility on the government to improve their conditions.
He said that it was more complicated than just raising their wages, which is absolutely true, it is more complicated than that. Housing is expensive, and not because it’s Disney’s fault. But what was infuriating about his response was that [he said] raising their wages wouldn’t make a difference and therefore we’re not going to raise their wages. It honestly felt to me what he was really saying was, “I will do anything except raise their wages.” And that’s the part that really made me angry.
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