There have been so many things that feel up in the air right now. Nobody knows when things will be back to normal (or even when we can start to figure out what the new normal will be like). People don’t know when they will be working again. The entertainment industry is at a complete halt and there is no timeline for when we can start working again. It’s overwhelming and scary.
On top of that, there have been many issues with people who don’t have a traditional job to get unemployment. If you were only an independent contractor, they did create a new system to be eligible. I’m so grateful for that since all my income is 1099 and I don’t qualify normally. As easy as it was for me to apply, I’m still dealing with issues as they never asked me how much I made and my unemployment amount is not what it should be. But my issues are much easier than others. Some people who worked both W2 and 1099 income can only apply for unemployment under the standard system. So if they made $50,000 last year and $49,000 was 1099 and $1,000 was W2, they have to file with the $1,000 of W2 income (which makes the amount they get significantly less than it should be).
There are also issues with people who have incorporated and are dealing with small business options. I know the government is doing their best and this is not what they ever expected to happen, but it’s still hard when there are so many people depending on things to be fixed so they don’t have to worry how they will pay the bills.
A lot of these unique circumstances are unique to people in the entertainment industry. So when I heard that our union president, Gabrielle Carteris, was doing a town hall, I knew I wanted to watch. And the town hall was also hosted by the president of IATSE, Matthew Loeb so it was going to discuss issues that other entertainment industry employees would have. But it wasn’t just SAG-AFTRA and IATSE, Congressman Schiff was going to be a part of it so we could hear what a representative of our government thinks and we could share some of our concerns to him.
I didn’t submit a question, but I was very interested to hear what others were worried about. And a lot of issues I expected, like the split income for unemployment, was covered and Congressman Schiff seemed surprised that we had that issue as the bill they passed was supposed to prevent that. And it was good to hear someone who felt very strongly about us needing to get back to work but needing to be cautious so things don’t get worse. There was no sugarcoating things, our industry might be one of the last ones to come back due to the large number of people that would be on set or the fact that actors work very close to each other (and that’s not counting intimate scenes). But it was hopeful to hear that Congressman Schiff does want to figure out how we can work and get back to making the entertainment that so many people have been spending their days watching.
I know that acting work won’t be coming back soon, but I hope it will be not too far away. There are so many things I miss about the entertainment industry and I know they can’t start up again until it is safer for us to gather in groups. We had no clue that things would get like this as quickly as they did, so there is a chance that things can get better just as quickly. But I don’t want the government to rush it and force us to go back into isolation to stop another surge.
I guess the unknowns will just have to continue for a while longer until more is understood and can be known.
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