As expected, it’s happening: Sometime this afternoon, the Writers Guild of America uberlords will announce the precise date and time when the writers strike will commence. And every man, woman and child in Los Angeles County will be put out of work.

Well, not quite, but almost: When productions shut down, casts and crews’ income disappears. When that happens, they quit spending money, on restaurants (those near studios and networks have already reported diminished earnings, and the strike hadn’t even begun), on gizmos, on cars, on home remodeling, on Lakers tickets, on everything else sold in town.

So: The local economy is facing a catastrophic freefall. And all because the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers won’t cough up a buck or two more in writers’ revenue for DVD sales.

I could be wrong here, but DVD royalties seem to be the biggest sticking point here. Sure, the writers are demanding other concessions – money from online proceeds, establishing “story editors” on reality shows as the writers they are – but home video is what really sticks in the WGA’s craw. That 1988 writers strike that paralyzed the industry and cost the industry half a billion dollars resulted in a contract that still ended up screwing writers; good work there.

Dire prognosticators suggest this strike could cost everyone $1 or $2 billion.

So, herewith: Suggestions as to where both sides should cave in.

* First off: Acknowledge the escalating evolution both of technologies and viewer habits, and make this a short-term deal – you can come back and renegotiate in three to five years, when it’s clearer what’s working and what’s not in terms of new and old media.

* DVD royalties: AMPTP, give the WGA whatever they want. That 1988 contract essentially ignored home video. Since then, VHS gave way to DVDs, making seasons of TV shows a far more lucrative home-video market, and the revenues for films were bolstered – 40 percent of a movie’s earnings come from DVD sales. Even the folks on AMPTP’s side that I’ve chatted with concede that the WGA is getting reamed on this count. So quit being so stingy, producers, and share the wealth.

* Online and digital media: WGA, fold on this one, at least for the time being. Acknowledge that broadcast network shows are being watched by fewer and fewer people, and that if someone’s finding a show online, chalk that up to job security (people watching your stuff online could end up supporting it more by watching it when it actually airs). If, in the past, your shows were watched by 15 million people on TV, and now they’re being watched by 10 million people on TV with an additional 1 or 2 million online, why should you get more money? If we hit a point where everything’s available on-demand and network schedules are rendered meaningless, then you revisit this issue. And my first point – making this a short contract – addresses that.

* Reality programming: Writers want those working on them to get WGA benefits and credit; producers don’t, because if that happens, the shows suddenly become a lot less cheap to produce. Writers: Give this one away. Have you watched a reality show lately? Most of them are utter crap, and, as opposed to the early, halcyon days of the genre, most of them fare pretty badly these days. Why would you want to be associated with this sh!t in the first place? Besides, a lot of people working on them do so precisely because they can’t land a more prestigious job.

Pursuing this argument won’t result in more actually scripted series or fewer reality shows or equitable pay for reality-show drones. Because producers are cagey and would probably figure out how to designate only a couple of “writers” per reality series, it would just result in a handful of hacks earning a smidgen more money. So let it go, and trust viewers – as they have been – to reject the genre.

If someone with better, insider knowledge of the negotiations can explain to me why these suggestions have not utterly solved the crisis (and that’s what the comments section is for, so get to it), then I’m going to redirect my attentions and focus on a coherent exit strategy for Iraq.