Los Angeles without Hollywood: What Happens?
Los Angeles without Hollywood: What Happens?
There are 88 cities in Los Angeles County. Ten million people. Over two hundred different languages are used.
And a nine-letter word that, for a significant portion of the world, encapsulates the entirety of the region: Hollywood.
This week, a rare actors’ strike upended the trademark industry in Los Angeles, and as a result, the potential for cascading economic consequences across Southern California has emerged as a major local issue. Los Angeles has long been considered as the global “company town” for the entertainment industry, and as a result,
the possibility for cascading economic impacts has arisen as a critical local issue. However, opinions among economists regarding the extent to which the simultaneous strike by actors and writers will be felt are split.
Hollywood has never provided more than approximately 5 percent of employment in an area where many more people work in commerce, health care, government, and even the dwindling manufacturing sector in Southern California. Even the most liberal estimates put the amount of employment that Hollywood has supported at around 5 percent.
But Hollywood is so ingrained in the culture of Los Angeles that its influence can be seen in something as seemingly insignificant as a street closure before an awards show.
Many people feel as though the halted productions and cancelled premieres are not just a threat to the flow of funds to restaurants and businesses that cater to film crews, but that they are also a blow to the cultural core of the region.
“To the extent that Hollywood defines America’s idea of where I live, Hollywood’s troubles become my troubles,” said D.J. Waldie, a cultural historian in Southern California. “My troubles become Hollywood’s troubles.” “When Hollywood stops, a great many things stop here, and it’s not just a few studios.”
One research estimates that the state of California’s economy suffered a loss of $2.1 billion as a result of the screenwriters’ strike in 2007. The last time that unionised screenwriters and actors conducted simultaneous walkouts was in the year 1960, and it took nearly six months for the strikes to be resolved.
On Friday, economists stated that the duration of the two strikes will play a significant role in determining the financial impact that they will have on Los Angeles, although some economists were more optimistic than others.
Lee Ohanian, an economics professor at the University of California,
Los Angeles, who has written extensively about California, estimated that approximately 20 percent of the local economy could be affected. This is in part due to the fact that the industry generates such a large amount of revenue and has such a large number of highly compensated employees locally.
According to Chris Thornberg, a founding partner at the Los Angeles consulting firm Beacon Economics, the strikes may not be felt locally for a significant amount of time because a significant portion of the entertainment industry has been focused on capitalising on and disseminating content that already exists.Dr Thornberg added that as long as customers continue to pay for Hulu and buy Disney movies online, the company will continue to generate revenue.
“Eventually, there will come a time when the lack of content will start to pinch, but this is a slow boil, not a rapid one,” the author says. “This is a slow boil, not a rapid one.”
The Mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, has made it quite plain that she views the labour stalemate as an important local matter, and she has issued a demand for the studios and the unions to “work around the clock” in order to come to an arrangement that is fair for all parties involved.
“This affects all of us, and it is essential to our overall economy,” said Mayor Bass.
The potential impact on Southern California’s sense of self-image is more difficult to quantify. The entertainment industry is intertwined with the municipal identity of the region in ways that are unmatched in places with less widespread recognition.
This year, the Academy Awards, which are considered to be the most prestigious workplace party in Los Angeles, had an audience of 18.7 million people. The locals see landmarks such as Venice Beach and the Sixth Street Viaduct as stars in their own right,
and they take great delight in this fact. Renting out their homes for commercial and film production can be a lucrative side business for homeowners all the way from South Pasadena to the San Fernando Valley.
especially though the majority of renowned names live in mansions behind gates, few Angelenos, especially in the far-flung exurbs, are without a celebrity story — the producer seen in Joshua Tree, the famous face in the next lane in traffic. Even though the majority of famous names live in mansions behind gates, few Angelenos, even in the far-flung exurbs, are without a celebrity story.
“No matter where I go, people want to know the same thing:
What celebrities have I talked to?” Stephen Cheung, president and chief executive officer of the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation, was quoted as saying something along these lines. If I were from a different city, no one would ever ask me that question.
Mr. Cheung, who is now 44 years old and was born in Hong Kong, has stated that he saw his first genuine superstar when he was approximately 10 years old in Los Angeles via the window of a car. “We were standing close to the convention centre in the middle of the city when all of a sudden, a car pulled up, and I saw Madonna get out of it.”
People in the nation’s second-largest metropolis know each other on a first-name basis, thus many residents have celebrity acquaintances in the form of neighbours, fellow parents, or people they meet while walking their dogs. Entertainers frequently find themselves in hot water with the mayor when they try to patch up potholes in their own neighbourhoods after sponsoring local schools, starting second careers as politicians, and campaigning for ballot initiatives at the state level.
