AgLA06 said:

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C@LAg said:

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TCTTS said:

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I ate McDonald's for the first time in forever the other day. Got a Big Mac meal (medium size) and a six piece nuggets. Cost me $18 damn dollars. Couldn't believe it.

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best fast food deal, bar none... is the Wendy's $5 combos.

small drink, jr bacon cheeseburger, small fries, 4 chicken nuggets.

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Burger King's 2 whopper juniors for $5 is far off.

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Whopper Junior is like Jumbo Shrimp

Urban Ag said:

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Isn't the film industry essentially global at this point? I mean, you can go back to the Star Wars OT and the three movies were filmed in California, England, Tunisia, Norway, and Arizona, with actors from the US and UK. I can't imagine the regulatory environment in London is less costly than CA.

I mean, financially, the studios being home based in CA isn't doing them any favors but it seems like a completely national/global product at this point and to a certain extent has been for decades.

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London has the highest cost of living in all of England, but it's still not as high as LA, neither is Oslo. I didn't look up the others, but I assume LA is way higher all of those.

And in addition to having to pay California employees a wage that enables them to afford the ridiculous cost of California living, corporations themselves have to pay ridiculous taxes too. And it's only going to get worse. The state as a whole is in $145B in debt. They have to recoup that money somehow. And they LOVE grabbing that from corporations and billionaires who supposedly need to pay their "fair share".

TCTTS said:

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Ha, sorry, not engaging with him any further.

Beyond his blatant misunderstanding of the industry, the strikes, etc, his anti-California rant at the end that post tells me everything I need to know about where he's coming from (as if I didn't already). I indeed live in LA, and while I'm no fan of Newsom or many of the state's economic policies/decisions, it's simply never as bad as people like aTmAg make it out to be, and most of it hardly affects my day-to-day personally. Never mind the fact that, for the time being, I have to live here for the kind of work I do.

Otherwise, I've said my piece and am done here.

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The fact you think economic policies "hardly affects [your] day-to-day personally" tells me all I need to know. You simply have no clue how the world works.

GrayMatter said:

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I think the OP theory is flawed and overreaching in my opinion. As TCTTS has already mentioned, I think it's complicated and can't really pinpoint to one or two factors.

Inflation hasn't helped but I think people just aren't going to the movies anymore in general.

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People go to movies less, but they watch streaming and TV more. It's not like everybody is going outside and playing pickup basketball or anything. If anything, people watch MORE media than decades ago, not less. So there should still be plenty of demand for writers, actors, producers, etc.

Aggie_Journalist said:

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If the OP thinks California policies caused the recent bust, do they also credit California policies for turning Hollywood into the most influential media creator on the planet?

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Yes. California wasn't always this way. It used to be the state of opportunity.

Hell the whole reason Hollywood started in the first place was to get away from Thomas Edison and his patents.

Aggie_Journalist said:

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If the OP thinks California policies caused the recent bust, do they also credit California policies for turning Hollywood into the most influential media creator on the planet?

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Yes. California wasn't always this way. It used to be the state of opportunity.

Hell the whole reason Hollywood started in the first place was to get away from Thomas Edison and his patents.

It warms my heart to know all things Hollywood are struggling

The Porkchop Express said:

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aTmAg said:

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I thought about bumping the strike thread, but this deserves it's own.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj6er83ene6o

Quote:

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"We were saving to buy a house, we had money, we had done things the right way," he says. "Two years ago, I didn't worry about going out to dinner with my wife and kids and spending 200 bucks."
"Now I worry about going out and spending $5 on a value meal at McDonald's."

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I don't know what's more unbelievable, that the guy thinks it's totally normal to go to a dinner with his wife and kids that costs $200 or that he thinks McDonald's value meals still cost $5.

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And the took the ever present BOGO big Mac off the app.

91_Aggie said:

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Again, the basis of the downturn in the article is a contract drone operator who chose an industry ("expert drone operator") that now has thousands of expert drone operators

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The guy was simply an example used to illustrate a broader point. He's also an actor so he's experienced the decline in production across two fields.

That format was once called a "Wall Street Journal lead" because they were famous for using individual's stories to draw the reader into a bigger piece. It's a common technique.

Also, the article quotes the mayor of LA who created a task force to study new incentives to help the TV/film industry. So clearly there is a problem.

It seems to me Hollywood's big problems are:

1) Enough people worldwide aren't willing to pay the price to see most of their new movies.

Why is that?
A) People worldwide don't have enough disposable income.
B) Many people don't want to see much of the garbage Hollywood churns out. People went to see Top Gun Maverick and Mission Impossible 6. But they don't turn out in big numbers to see most of the crap Hollywood loves to spew out but people hate.
C) Netflix, Prime, Hulu, Peacock and other streaming services are tough competition for new movies at the theater.

California's Republican Governor Earl Warren did make for a pretty good Supreme Court Justice.

I don't think a single person here is disagreeing with how much California is destroying their economy. Rather, we're disagreeing with the notion that California's economy is the primary driver of the current woes that the film and television industry is experiencing, on a global level.

That, and I'm well aware that we pay more for food, gas, etc, but the trade-off for me is that I get to make good money doing what I love, with people I love, in a part of the country I love. Sure, it has its downsides too, but so does everywhere else. It all depends on what's worth it to you, personally, not what some keyboard warrior thousands of miles away appraises of an experience he can't possibly know or empathize with one way or the other.

TCTTS said:

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I don't think a single person here is disagreeing with how much California is destroying their economy. Rather, we're disagreeing with the notion that California's economy is the primary driver of the current woes that the film and television industry is experiencing, on a global level.

That, and I'm well aware that we pay more for food, gas, etc, but the trade-off for me is that I get to make good money doing what I love, with people I love, in a part of the country I love. Sure, it has its downsides too, but so does everywhere else. It all depends on what's worth it to you, personally, not what some keyboard warrior thousands of miles away appraises of an experience he can't possibly know or empathize with one way or the other.

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Just busting your balls man. You do you.

Maybe the answer is that Hollywood needs to fracture like an earthquake and film studios move to more affordable locales to build back better. This isn't exactly the first time a business hasn't been able to sustain its location and moves.

KT_Ag08 said:

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An economics expert analogizing turning a machine back on to writing a film is amazing.

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What is even more amazing is analogizing the result of a strike to covid. That is what I was countering.

Feel free to make an actual retort.

The Porkchop Express said:

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Maybe the answer is that Hollywood needs to fracture like an earthquake and film studios move to more affordable locales to build back better. This isn't exactly the first time a business hasn't been able to sustain its location and moves.

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I love this. Would want the same thing for federal agencies. But it's just not likely for Hollywood. There's economies of scale for everyone participating to do so close together. The more likely scenario is that it finds it's new footing and rebounds, or they all sink together while competitors in other places rise up.