>>118065913It doesn't. It costs comparatively little to animate, but the stars are on a high episode rate (which is renegotiated every time the show is renewed for more seasons, so old estimates from a decade ago are probably highly inaccurate now). Most of the cost is from paying the VAs - back when it did cost something like $5m an episode, they were paying $300k per actor per episode, or something like. For a show that's at its peak that's relatively tame, especially for shows that were going before network/cable became obsolete - if you think about how much the Friends cast were making for the final season that's $6m per episode on main stars alone, or almost $150m per season, and that's before we get to crew, sets, costumes, and everything else. I think at one time early in the Simpsons runs Harry Shearer was said to be making $5m a year from it and so didn't much care if the quality dropped.
Assuming a more modest $200k/episode for the main cast (after several rounds of renegotiation), that's about $1.4m on salary (assuming the main cast all appear, but they may only be guaranteed a minimum percentage of appearances per season, with payment due for that minimum whether or not they appear). So probably a little over $2m, maybe as much as $2.5m, to produce and animate unless the producers are getting paid six figure salaries as well. The directors and so on are not making six figures with very few likely exceptions. People just don't in tv any more.
But if you spread that cost across all the territories that it'll be shown in it's peanuts. Then you've got Tapped Out and all the other merch - which allows them to keep voice costs down on the show by offering other work/percentages to the mains - and to be honest, even if it's selling quite modestly today compared to the high point, it's still going to make enough to justify the new seasons.
