Up till now the big worry in Hollywood was whether in the midst of a recession and after the devastation of last springs Writers Guild Strike, would the Screen Actor Guild(SAG), representing Hollywood actors, have the nerve to call a strike. Well that possibility is now minor to television work, when you consider the jobs lost as NBC announces that Jay Leno will retire from the Tonight Show, but will have a new daily hour long show Monday thru Friday at 10pm each night. 
This new show will wipe out five hours of regular NBC episodic production affecting thousands of television production jobs. And unlike the SAG strike possibility; this is a done deal.
It is all about bang for the buck and NBC trying to save money and embarrassment. If NBC had let Leno just walk away, he probably would have wound up on another network competing against new Tonight Show Host Conan O'Brien. The Tonight Show would have definitely lost a big chunk of it's audience to the competing Leno show and that would have been embarra
ssing.
But the "bang for the buck", is once again a network succeeding in finding programming that cost little to initially produce and does not give residual payments to producers directors, writers and actors. We see this now as reality TV programs are a main stay of television viewing 8pm to 9pm. The Monday thru Friday 10pm time slot, up till now, was still the one guaranteed television home for hour long dramas.
Right now it cost each network approximately 2 million dollars to produce one episode of an hour long drama. So the cost to NBC for 5 different hour long dramas(Monday thru Friday 10pm to 11pm) is approximately 10 million dollars. The networks recoup this money thru advertising and when the shows are sold in to reruns (aka syndication). The producers, directors,writers and actors receive residual payments for reuse of their services. It will only cost about 2 million dollars for the "entire week" of the new Jay Leno show. Saving NBC 8 million dollars a week.
Multiply that 8 times a 22 week regular schedule and that is a savings of $164 million dollars!
Further savings for NBC and job loss for industry workers will be seen during Pilot Season. More Math: For every one hour drama committed to a time slot, there are at least 4 other dramas made/produced, but do not get picked up. So on the conservative side, if 3 new one hour dramas are picked up for broadcast, there were at least 15 total pilots made. Those 15 shows are usually filmed when other production has stopped and everyone is unemployed. These 15 pilots and the jobs they'd bring are now lost.
For NBC, and also ABC, CBS there is an added bonus. With the loss of the 15 pilots, the 3 new shows, syndication/reruns; there are no jobs, no residual payments or pension and health contributions to unions. Therefore the unions and members are weakened for the next round of negotiations.
And just so no one thinks this article is union propaganda, lets not forget about the loss to other non union jobs that will be lost. Copying and printing, caterer, wardrobe shops, agents, managers, security, lumber sales for set construction, trailer car truck and light equipment rental, makeup, food and fuel sales, location scouting, bookkeepers and payroll services... just to name a few.
NBC has just put the first major hit on Hollywood for 2009, thanks and Oh', good luck with the new gig Jay.