In the event you work in leisure, you in all probability heard some variation of this final 12 months: “Survive ’til ’25.”
Issues have been bleak. In a current article from The Wall Road Journal, the reporting goes so far as to name Los Angeles’ manufacturing prospects “a catastrophe film.”
The numbers are stark.
In accordance with the Bureau of Labor Statistics, round 100,000 individuals had been employed in Los Angeles County’s movement image trade on the finish of 2024. Two years earlier, that determine stood at 142,000.
That is a lack of 42,000 jobs—practically a 3rd of the workforce—in simply 24 months.
The decline exhibits no indicators of stopping.
WSJ’s report paints a now-familiar image—an Oscar-winning sound mixer who cannot discover a gig, an animator who labored on Pocahontas who’s out of labor. These are proficient individuals having to recalibrate all the things they learn about Hollywood.
FilmLA, the official movie workplace for town and county, reported that on-location manufacturing was down 22% within the first quarter of 2025 in comparison with the identical interval final 12 months.
Tv manufacturing has been particularly hard-hit. The area reached a peak of 18,560 annual shoot days in 2021. By 2024, that quantity had plummeted to only 7,716. It is a 58.4% decline in three years.
Paul Audley, president of FilmLA, instructed NBC Los Angeles that 2024 was “the worst 12 months on file, excluding COVID.”
The primary quarter of 2025 appears even worse. Each main class of manufacturing, from tv dramas to commercials, logged fewer shoot days in comparison with the 12 months earlier than.
Why Is This Occurring?
What’s driving this collapse? A number of elements have made this unemployment stew.
We’ve got not but recovered from the WGA and SAG strikes. The streaming bubble has burst, with main firms pulling again on content material spending after years of explosive development. The fires uprooted many on the west aspect of town, and rebuilding is gradual, so some have opted to depart city.
California has additionally misplaced vital floor to rivals. Audley stated the state now ranks sixth on this planet for filming, behind Toronto, the U.Okay., Vancouver, central Europe, and Australia. Between 2020 and 2024, an estimated 71% of tasks that didn’t safe California’s tax credit moved out of state.
The Leisure Neighborhood Fund (previously The Actors Fund) reported distributing greater than $5.6 million to nearly 3,000 individuals within the first half of 2024. That is practically six occasions the pre-pandemic common.
The group’s Western area government director, Keith McNutt, stated that requests for psychological well being providers, profession counseling, and assist teams have surged (by way of Sherwood Information).
The Artwork Administrators Guild reported in 2024 that 75% of its 3,000 members are presently unemployed (by way of Indiewire). The guild additionally suspended its Manufacturing Design Initiative program, which provides paid coaching in numerous artwork division roles, as a result of there merely aren’t sufficient jobs for trainees.
Unemployment in movie and TV hit 16.1% in June 2024. Author Morgan Evans stated on TikTok that the determine was “worse than half as dangerous because the Nice Despair.”
The leisure trade’s August unemployment fee was 10.9%, greater than double the nationwide common (4.3%).
Credit score: ppengcreative/iStock
Employees throughout all corners of the trade are struggling. It isn’t simply writers and actors and manufacturing people who usually face employment gaps. Salaried workers in advertising, growth, and accounting (historically extra secure positions) are additionally discovering it difficult to keep up work.
Governor Gavin Newsom proposed increasing California’s Movie & Tv Tax Credit score Program in October 2024, calling for the annual cap to double from $330 million to $750 million.
However with manufacturing persevering with to say no in 2025, the query stays whether or not coverage intervention can reverse the exodus of labor from LA.
Help Sources for Unemployed Movie and TV Employees
For these going through monetary hardship, a number of organizations supply help.
Movement Image & Tv Fund (MPTF): Gives short-term emergency monetary help to certified leisure trade members experiencing hardship as a consequence of sickness, incapacity, unemployment, or different causes.
Leisure Neighborhood Fund: Gives emergency monetary help to professionals in theater, movie, tv, radio, music, dance, opera, and circus.
