ALTHOUGH for many Brits Disneyland is synonymous with the Paris and Florida Parks, the original park opened in Anaheim, California, in 1955. Disney now also has parks in Tokyo, Hong Kong and Shanghai.

According to marketing, Disneyland is the “happiest place on Earth” — however this hasn’t always been the case for those who work there.

Concerns about working conditions at Disneyland in California and Disneyworld in Florida are nothing new. In 1984 2,000 cast members (as Disney calls its employees) went on strike in protest against a two-year pay freeze, no health insurance for part-time workers and the threat of outsourcing.

Eventually the majority of union members backed a new deal which included raises from 3 to 8 per cent, along with a commitment to limit outsourcing as well as retaining health benefits for part-time and seasonal workers providing they worked for at least 20 hours a week. However the two-year pay freeze remained.

Since 1984 Disney in California has added California Disney, Downtown Disney and hotels to its portfolio, resulting in a more dispersed, less unified workforce. Although 17,000 of the 30,000 California Disney workers are still unionised, according to the 2018 Disney Resort worker survey around 85 per cent make less than $15 an hour, 11 per cent were homeless while nearly half were part time.

In 2018 the Orange County register of voters accepted a petition signed by 10 per cent of voters to force major Anaheim employers including Disneyland, to pay their employees a living wage of $15 an hour.

This campaign, supported by Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, was inspired by the Fight for $15 campaign organised by fast-food workers. Although Disney agreed to implement the pay rise staggered over two years, in December 2019 a group of Disneyland workers filed a lawsuit arguing that the company was failing to meet the living wage demand.

Earlier in 2019 heiress Abigail Disney was contacted by a Disneyland employee distressed by the working conditions at the park. She later went “undercover” to meet workers at the park, many of whom told her they were trying to maintain a happy appearance at work while struggling to make ends meet.

Disney said that she was “livid” with what she heard and was deeply critical of the huge gap between the large salary of then CEO Bob Iger and ordinary park workers.

According to The Nation Iger, who stepped down after 15 years in March, received a salary that was 1,424 times that of the median wage of Disney workers — one of the highest CEO-worker gaps in the US. Tickets to the park now cost over $100 with 18 million visitors coming last year.

Workers at Disneyworld are usually paid around $14-$15 an hour, just above the Florida living wage. Despite the fact that the average family spend $6,300 for a week-long visit to the park, wages are 68 per cent lower than the national average.

Former Disneyworld cast members have alleged being refused time off for weddings despite giving the company nine month’s notice, being forced to do overtime and very long shifts. In 2017 the US Department of Labour found Disney guilty of forcing cast members to pay for their own costume and failing to compensate them for overtime worked.

Tokyo Disneyland, which was the first Disney Park to open outside the United States in 1983, has its own issues.

In 2017 an acrobat died following a 10-metre-high fall, while later that year a 28-year-old contract worker won damages against the company after claiming she suffered a nerve ailment following months of donning heavy costumes.

This unnamed contractor argued that she had to perform in about 50 parades while keeping her arms above her face for 45 minutes on each occasion. Another former female employee launched a lawsuit against the park citing harassment and bullying claiming managers told her to “go die.”

Disneyland Paris was rocked by the two suicides of two chefs in 2010. One, according to his union Force Ouvriere, was the subject of alleged “humiliating” treatment at work, while another who was supposed to be returning after a period of sickness wrote in a note “I don’t want to work for Mickey anymore.”

Unions have also complained about job cuts, longer hours, poor management and an increase in industrial accidents.

In October 2013 this appeared to be reinforced when a Disney employee poured petrol over his head and had to be restrained from setting himself alight by a colleague after being summoned to a meeting by management.

Last year the park’s Main Street had to be temporarily closed after a protest by contracted cleaning and logistic workers regarding unfair pay and working conditions.

When Hong Kong Disneyland opened in 2005, Disney stated that although it respected the right of workers to seek union representation, it felt it was more productive for workers and management “to communicate directly with one another.”

In April 2006 the Hong Kong Disneyland Cast Members Union complained about poor pay, excessive hours and the sweltering heat inside their costumes. Unlike Tokyo it has struggled to attract sufficient numbers of visitors. As a result in 2016 Disney cut around 100 jobs at the park blaming a lack of visitors on political unrest.

Shanghai Disneyland opened in 2016 as part of a joint venture between Disney and Chinese state-owned enterprises. However, initially Shanghai employees were only paid a quarter to a third of what workers at the other Chinese park received. These figures were criticised by the trade union representatives in Hong Kong who claimed they were exploiting “low-pay Shanghai workers.”

There have also been serious concerns surrounding the working conditions of the migrant labour used to build the park and the local Chinese labour used to produce toys and other products for its parks worldwide. According to an investigation by China Labour Investigation, workers in a Disney supplier in Guangdong province earned $1.30 to $1.50 per hour.

Disney workers have been hit hard by the Covid-19 Pandemic. Although after an agreement with unions 43,000 workers were furloughed in April, Disney stopped paying 100,000 of its workers — nearly 50 per cent of its workforce — with many of its US employees reliant on welfare benefits.

Despite some protests from staff, Disneyworld and Disneyland reopened in July and staff claim that there is a lack of onsite testing facilities with Disney saying that testing wasn’t viable. After pressure from unions voluntary testing was introduced at the Florida Park, however employees are not going to be paid for the time it takes to get tested.

There have also been reports that Disney has underplayed the number of Covid-19 cases in the area surrounding the California Park and asked “cast members” to come to work even if they were Covid-19 positive. In Paris it took several positive Covid-19 cases to occur before the park was shut.

Although the Shanghai and Tokyo parks were able to successfully reopen, Disney bosses in Hong Kong asked cast members to take a day’s unpaid leave a week last month after the city was hit by the “third wave” of the virus. According to the Hong Kong Disney Cast Members Association around 4,000 cast members were affected.

Ironically for an organisation founded by a survivor of the 1918 influenza pandemic, Disney hasn’t taken a proactive approach in the safety of its employees during this pandemic. While there is no doubt that Disney parks have lost money due to Covid-19, over a long period of time, the pay of Disney bosses has gone up — often at the same time as ticket prices — while wages have remained static.

Working conditions need to be improved in a “new normal” that truly makes Disney “a magical place to work.”