We’ve all heard this same story before. X idol of 10+ years reveal they’ve never made any money. We hear about it and we kneejerk react about how Y company is evil, and how all kpop idols should be paid. What we never talk about is how much the system actually favors the idol.
Let’s think about it. Assuming, there’s nothing shady happening behind the scenes, most idols for the most part, are granted housing, food, and free training during their time as a kpop idol / trainee. They invest literally $0 in capital towards their debut, but they’re guaranteed a % of the profits. If the group fails, idols are liable for $0 of their debt. Idols only pay back into their trainee debt only if they are profitable. The big 4 outside of HYBE don’t even have trainee debt. What this means is that Idols can only win, they can never lose. Idols either walk away with $0 or enough to never work for the rest of their lives after 7 years.
OFC, if we look at the opportunity cost, we can be like oh they would have made $X if they just worked at a regular job. But that’s the whole point of risk vs reward. If someone came up to you and said, if you work for me for 7 years, you can either make $0, or have a 2% chance of making millions. Would you take that deal? Some people would, some people wouldn’t. But guess what? That’s pretty much the same as running a business. Around 2% of businesses make more than $1m, and most businesses fail. Running a business also means you have to risk your own money in, and potentially lose money.
What’s even crazier is that we never talk about the winners. Big 4 idols have nearly a 100% success rate. They make more money than most of us will make in our lives over a span of 7 years. The big winners like BTS, and BP, make enough to support generations of family members. Along with these big winners, there are more than 100 idols who have benefited from the system. They’ve gone from nothing to millionaires in a span of a short 7 years.
Imagine if these idols were paid a safe, guaranteed salary instead of % profit share. Kpop fans would be rioting, regardless. AKB in japan actually has that system. Idols, regardless of how popular they are, are paid a salary. At the time, Sakura of LSF was the most popular idol in japan. She was rumored to only make $100,000 per year. She was bringing in millions for her company, but only getting paid peanuts. The price of a guaranteee salary was limited upside. Imagine if BP got paid $100,000 after bringing in YG billions of dollars.
Now, I know the argument that’s going to be presented against the system. Can’t idols get paid a salary and a % of profits? In an ideal world, they can. However, as I’ve stated previously, idols debut literally risk free. They’re trained, housed, and fed for free. They shoulder 0% of the debt. They’re given a % profit share while risking 0 capital. Regular company workers don’t get paid significantly more if an idol does well. The company and its investors are taking 100% of the risk for less than 100% of the profits. We all talk about how some idols make $0 after 10 years. Behind the scenes investors are -$10,000,000+ after 10 years. The terms already favor the idol, it’s hard to argue that they deserve more. On the opposite end, an idol that succeeds makes millions, to ten millions, and for the extremely lucky, hundreds of millions. A teenager gets to reap business like profits while risking $0 of their own money.
We talk about how scummy and evil the kpop system is, but is it really? To me, (assuming there’s nothing shady going on) the kpop seems really fair and biased towards idols. The idols who win, win big. Those who lose, leave with 0 debt. Just because people take a risk, and it doesn’t work out, doesn’t mean anyone is evil. That’s just a part of life.
submitted by /u/NoLagPlz
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