The Change Mariner

Lost Film Jobs: Entertainment workers call on Arnold for help

RedlandsDaily:
More than 300 members of Teamsters Local 399 and members of other labor unions held a boisterous rally Friday morning to protest against California losing film and television production jobs to Canada and other countries and called upon Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger for his help.

The rally was decidedly anti-Canadian with speakers assailing the U.S. neighbor to the north for luring a flood of productions out of Los Angeles and other parts of the state with its lower production costs.

Alarcon expressed his feelings bluntly: ``This is b---s---! The audacity of these people to come into our town to try and steal our jobs and our business. Just as we are fighting this so-called war in Iraq, we need to fight a war against those people who are stealing jobs away from California.''

A study by Encino-based Center for Entertainment Industry Data and Research stated that since Canada began offering tax subsidies five years ago to film production companies for major films, the U.S. economy has lost about $4 billion in economic benefits, equal to about 25,000 jobs per year.

Many of those very workers who have suffered from the situation were among those in the crowd Friday holding signs which read: ``Canada: We need to feed our families too! Don't steal our jobs.''

``When we started 11-12 years ago, they were shooting everywhere in this town, like 15 movies a day,'' he said. ``We used to make a couple of phone calls and we'd get right on a movie. The movie industry has been completely stolen away.''