“Foreign governments have successfully lured film and television productions, and the multitude of jobs they create, away from the United States with aggressive tax incentives and subsidies. Films intended for initial release in the U.S. are increasingly being shot overseas—and American workers and our economy are paying the price.”
The entertainment industry has taken an unrelenting beating over the past several years—streaming wars, the pandemic, mergers and layoffs, strikes, and accelerating runaway production have gutted the industry, leaving record numbers without work and little hope of a rebound. Runaway productions generally refer to productions intended for release or broadcast in the United States but actually filmed in another country, or those made by L.A.-based studios that shoot in other states in order to take advantage of competitive tax incentives or other economic benefits.
Calling incentives offered to lure production overseas a “concerted effort” by other nations and thus a national security threat, the president said he was authorizing the Department of Commerce and the U.S. trade representative to immediately begin instituting 100 percent tariffs on “any and all movies coming into our Country that are produced in Foreign Lands.”
How exactly tariffs on foreign films would work—or really what even constitutes an American-made or foreign-made film in the age of streaming, co-production and globalized post-production—is yet to be determined.
Unlike most of Trump’s trade-related actions thus far, this latest salvo targets not physical goods that come through U.S. ports, but digitally transmitted services that rely on an increasingly international supply chain.
The impulse, at least, was appreciated among representatives of Hollywood’s beleaguered workforce.
“Studios chase cheap production costs overseas while gutting the American workforce that built the film and TV industry. These gigantic corporations line their pockets by relentlessly cutting corners, abandoning American crews, and exploiting tax loopholes,” Teamsters President Sean M. O’Brien and Motion Picture Division Director Lindsey Dougherty said in the statement.
The union’s motion picture and theatrical division represents drivers and transportation professionals, as well as casting directors, animal wranglers, and other crafts.
“We thank President Trump for boldly supporting good union jobs when others have turned their heads. This is a strong step toward finally reining in the studios’ un-American addiction to outsourcing our members’ work. The Teamsters applaud any elected official—Republican, Democrat, Independent—who’s willing to fight for American workers,” they said.
Teamsters Union members join striking Writers Guild of America and Screen Actors Guild members outside Amazon Studios in Culver City, Calif., on July 19, 2023. Years of streaming wars, the pandemic, mergers, strikes, layoffs, and runaway production have battered the entertainment industry, leaving record job losses and dim prospects for recovery. Chris Delmas/AFP via Getty Images
The president’s missive appeared to address the fact that an increasing number of American studio films are shot abroad—primarily in Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and European countries such as Hungary, which offer competitive subsidies and tax breaks, easy regulatory environments, and lower labor costs for producers trying to deliver a project on budget.
IATSE, which represents members in the United States and Canada, also struck a cautious tone, saying it supports all policy measures “that can be implemented to return and maintain U.S. film and television jobs, while not disadvantaging our Canadian members.”
IATSE urged federal policymakers to level the playing field for U.S. productions, including with a federal film production tax incentive, but said it would await further information about the administration’s proposed tariff plan. “We continue to stand firm in our conviction that any eventual trade policy must do no harm to our Canadian members—nor the industry overall.”
Toronto, the U.K, Vancouver, Central Europe, and Australia dominated the list, with U.S. hubs California, Georgia, and New Jersey ranked below them.
“Key factors influencing these preferences include favorable tax incentives, infrastructure, available skilled crew, and currency exchange rate,” the report said, noting an increasingly competitive market of tax incentive schemes will likely shape geographic distribution for years to come.
“The lower volumes are here to stay,” the report notes, showing the number of U.S. productions that started principal photography in the second quarter of 2024 fell nearly 40 percent from 2022 levels, compared with a 20 percent global dip.
“Each drop reflected the impact of global production cutbacks and California’s ongoing loss of work to rival territories,” the organization said in an April statement.
There is no central database or reliable way to track runaway production, which has been a subject of concern for Hollywood unions for at least the past two decades. But in the industry, many observe it has accelerated over the past five or so years at an unprecedented rate.
A pedestrian crosses a street in front of the Hollywood sign in Los Angeles on Oct. 7, 2021. Calling foreign film production incentives a “concerted effort” and national security threat, President Donald Trump said on May 4 he would authorize 100 percent tariffs on all movies made abroad. Mario Tama/Getty Images
‘Built by the Middle Class’
Other union leaders cautioned against a blanket tariff that fails to account for the realities of the industry.
“If this tariff policy is just a headline reaction to productions leaving the U.S., it’s not a solution, it’s sabotage,” David Graves, an executive board member with IATSE Local 728, which represents studio electrical lighting technicians, told The Epoch Times in a text message.
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Stressing that the film industry doesn’t run on the same timeline or structure as a brick-and-mortar business, Graves said a one-size-fits-all approach may do more harm than good unless informed by people who work in the industry.
“If the administration truly wants to understand how to apply tariffs to the American film industry, they need to talk to electricians, grips, camera operators, and wardrobe, not just A-list actors who are disconnected from the realities of payroll taxes, foreign incentives, and what economic contraction looks like on the ground,” Graves said.
Big-name producers and celebrity voices, he said, “don’t speak for the working-class crews who are watching their livelihoods disappear with no transition plan, no retraining support, and no safety net.”
A day after Trump’s tariff announcement, Oscar-winning actor Jon Voight, whom Trump previously named a “special ambassador” to Hollywood, said in a video posted to social media platform X that he submitted a detailed plan to the president at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida outlining “certain tax provisions” that would help both movie and TV production.
“Our industry recently has suffered greatly. … Many Americans have lost jobs to productions gone overseas. People have lost their homes, can’t feed their families,” Voight said.
In an emailed statement to The Epoch Times, Steven Paul, an advisor to Voight and CEO of SP Media Group, said the document published by Deadline was “part of a private discussion and was never intended for public consumption.”
The proposal was crafted “solely for the purpose of discussion,” Paul said, and didn’t reflect any formal policy or position. And while the ideas listed were gathered from exploratory conversations Voight and Paul had with a broad range of industry stakeholders, including unions, studios and streaming platforms, Paul said the leaked proposal “does not claim to represent the collective views of the participating film and television organizations.”
All of this would apply to content across the board, including for theatrical distribution, broadcast networks and cable, as well as streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon, and digital platforms such as YouTube.
The Netflix logo is seen atop its corporate offices in Los Angeles on Jan. 24, 2024. President Donald Trump announced a 100 percent tariff on films produced abroad, but many modern productions involve multiple countries, making it difficult to determine their origin—especially for projects commissioned by platforms such as Netflix. Mario Tama/Getty Images
The draft plan calls for a steep tariff for U.S.-based productions that elect to produce in a foreign country—120 percent of the value of the foreign incentive.
“This is not meant as a penalty, but as a necessary step to level the playing field, while not creating a never-ending cycle of chasing the highest incentive,” the document reads.
The draft plan also addresses “California-specific issues,” including the state’s “woefully inadequate” tax incentive, and calls Hollywood an “endangered species.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom was quick to respond, suggesting the state and federal government collaborate on a $7.5 billion federal tax incentive.
“California built the film industry—and we’re ready to bring even more jobs home,” Newsom wrote in a post on X. “We’ve proven what strong state incentives can do. Now it’s time for a real federal partnership to Make America Film Again. @POTUS, let’s get it done.”
If tariffs, or a combination of tariffs and increased domestic incentives, bring jobs back to the United States, Graves said, the next question is whether the United States has the infrastructure to support the volume of work.
“Foreign markets will respond faster than Washington can legislate. They will offer accredited investors more stable, reliable opportunities—boosting their liquidity, increasing mid-budget productions, and creating consistent employment pipelines abroad that the U.S. cannot currently match,” Graves said.
“The American film industry is not made up of the wealthy. It is built by the middle class. … When it comes to job creation and labor stability, it is not the blockbuster films that create employment at scale. It is the steady, mid-tier productions that do the heavy lifting.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks during a press conference at Raleigh Studios unveiling an expansion of California’s Film and Television Credit Program in Los Angeles on Oct. 27, 2024. Following Trump’s foreign film tariff announcement, Newsom proposed a $7.5 billion federal tax incentive and urged state-federal collaboration to support the entertainment industry. Mario Tama/Getty Images
Where Are Movies Made? There Is No Simple Answer
According to independent data analysis by Stephen Follows, a UK-based entertainment industry analyst, since 2000, around a third of global feature films can be classified as “American,” while major American studios accounted for more than 87 percent of all global features in 2024.
The data relies on IMDB’s self-reported country of origin.
“There is no universal database or framework for defining or verifying a film’s national identity,” Follows wrote in a Substack post following Trump’s announcement.
“IMDb allows producers to self-report, while awards bodies, festivals, and national funds each apply their own criteria. These systems often conflict, leading to different answers depending on who is asking and why.”
Further, he pointed out, many films today are co-productions between two or more countries, with streaming platforms such as Netflix routinely commissioning projects with no clear country of origin.
“A project might be developed in L.A., produced by a UK company, shot in Spain, and marketed as ‘international content.’ Principal photography might take place in more than one country, while post-production—special effects, editing and music—is increasingly a global phenomenon, outsourced to centers with burgeoning infrastructure in countries such as Canada, the U.K., New Zealand. and India.”
Any plan to impose tariffs would require a consensus on what determines a film’s national identity.
“Currently, the United States has no formal definition of what makes a film American. There is no certification process, no threshold of domestic content, and no single agency responsible for determining national status,” Follows wrote.
According to Follow’s analysis, about 24 percent percent of films made by Hollywood studios had at least one day of filming in the UK in 2019, and more than 19 percent had some photography in Canada.
If the president’s plan follows Voight’s recommendations, a requirement that “American-made” films and shows have at least 75 percent production and post-production done in the United States might be a starting point.
Indian actor Paresh Rawal (R) waits as director of photography Nirmal Jani (L, behind camera) prepares to film the Bollywood production
Structural Changes
Actors, directors, and producers, as well as their below-the-line counterparts, are accustomed to the ebb and flow of work in Hollywood—there are always lush times and lean ones. But this could be different.
Patrick Adler, co-founder of Westwood Economics and Planning Associates and co-author of the Otis report, said the new reality of Hollywood is more managerial, and best understood as a kind of Silicon Valley.
“Hollywood itself is not a place where films and TV shows get made, or where they get shot,” he told The Epoch Times in late 2024. “It’s a place where they’re generated—it’s like the brain, the nerve center of the industry, a huge management area and that hasn’t gone anywhere. It’s not going anywhere.”
Whereas Silicon Valley used to build chips and now outsources that function, he said, “No one ever says, ‘Silicon Valley is done because they don’t make silicon chips anymore.’ But for some reason, Hollywood people say Hollywood is dead because there’s runaway production. Well, production is a lot more like manufacturing silicon chips than doing the kind of core, value-added stuff,” he said.
“It’s not all about shooting.”
But for the tens of thousands of camera operators, grips, lighting technicians, costume department workers, hair and makeup artists, and composers who say work never returned after the strikes, that new reality means fewer spaces for the skilled trades and crafts that built the industry in the first place, and more power concentrated in a managerial class that increasingly outsources production to countries with cheaper labor.
Potential Repercussions
Unlike many industries in which President Trump is looking to address a trade deficit, the United States has a hearty surplus in film and television programming.
Tariffs, should they be implemented, could impact U.S. studios that co-produce and outsource various parts of a diverse international supply chain more than foreign-made film studios, which don’t have anywhere near the economic or cultural power that U.S studios do.
A man walks past movie posters at AMC Theater in Montebello, Calif., on May 5, 2025. Frederic J. Brown/AFP via Getty Images
Graves, of IATSE Local 728, cautioned against underestimating the response from foreign trading partners.
“Countries like Canada, the UK, and Australia have developed robust federal agencies dedicated to attracting film production,” he said, noting one of the main reasons mid-tier productions—those budgeted between $6 million and $35 million—are no longer viable in the United States is we don’t have federal infrastructure to support them.”
Such films are disappearing because investors can’t justify the risk, not because there’s a lack of demand, he said.
“Other countries have studied this. They understand that these smaller productions generate significant jobs with far less taxpayer investment. In response, they have created streamlined production and distribution incentives that we simply do not have, especially not at the federal level.”
If the United States were to enact 100 percent tariffs on all foreign content entering its market, he said, it may be grossly underestimating its competition’s ability to adapt.
“These nations are not just capable of retaliatory tariffs—they are capable of deploying better tax incentives, better infrastructure, distribution networks that attract even more of the work we are trying to bring home.”
UK and Canada Response
Politicians and union leaders in the United Kingdom and Canada expressed alarm over the potential impacts on an industry still recovering from the pandemic and the 2023 strikes.
Such foreign-incentivized production would presumably be a primary target of tariffs aimed at revitalizing U.S.-based production, although the Trump administration has not offered details. A White House spokesperson followed Trump’s initial announcement with a statement that “no final decisions have been made” and the administration was “exploring all options” to deliver on the president’s directive.
People walk past President Donald Trump’s star along the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Hollywood on April 17, 2024. Mario Tama/Getty Images
The Department of Commerce did not immediately respond to detailed questions about how the tariffs might work.
Michael Beavan, CEO of the Production Guild of Great Britain, struck a conciliatory tone in an emailed statement to The Epoch Times.
“PGGB stands shoulder to shoulder with our U.K. film partners to make sure that we protect both our world-class film industry and freelance workforce at this time of uncertainty around U.S. tariffs,” Beavan said.
“We have a long and mutually beneficial relationship with our U.S. filmmaker colleagues and friends, which will always be celebrated for its creativity and collaboration, regardless of geographical or political boundaries. We see no reason for this unquestionably successful partnership to be disrupted now or in the future.”
A media representative for the guild said it is working with representatives from across the U.K.’s screen agencies, broadcasters, studios, and streamers to formulate a response to the proposed tariffs.
Meanwhile, Philippa Childs, head of Bectu, which represents 40,000 workers in the entertainment and media industries in the UK, said in a statement that the tariffs, coming after COVID and the global slowdown, “could deal a knockout blow to an industry that is only just recovering and will be really worrying news for tens of thousands of skilled freelancers who make films in the UK.”
The government, she said, “must move swiftly to defend this vital sector, and support the freelancers who power it, as a matter of essential national economic interest.”
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