The system incurs those fixed costs based on how it anticipates they will pay off. With more money chasing content, the system will find it profitable to green-light more scripts at higher production values. But ultimately everybody’s favorite sound mixer has only two ears.

You can see this in football. In the U.K. satelite TV massively increased the market - no longer were people spending £30 a game to watch at a stadium with a capacity of 30k, they were spending £10 a game to watch on tv with a capacity of millions.

This extra cash poured into the salaries of the footballers in the top division, salary’s doubling every 4 or so years for a sustained period.

The money didn’t trickle down to lower divisions or youth training or on site staff.