Western

Reducing the Los Angeles economy to the entertainment industry would be a serious mistake. In fact, the L.A. labor market is highly diversified with world-class healthcare, professional services, biotech and technology clusters providing co-sector leadership — no one-trick pony is this. Nonetheless, the entertainment industry is the single element that separates this metro economy from all others, and its tentacles are long. In its absence, the metro’s financial and professional services, tourism and digital media sectors might seem almost ordinary. Hollywood content production has been curtailed dramatically by social distancing demands. Active filming in the second quarter plummeted 98 percent from the year before, according to nonprofit industry group FilmLA. This has a devastating effect on thousands of employees on industry payrolls and many times more freelancers, sole proprietors and contract employees that make up the bulk of the film and TV industry’s creative workers. Consequently, the L.A. labor market absorbed among the hardest blows dealt by COVID-19. Although second quarter L.A. County payroll employment declined only 12.4 percent year on year, in line with outcomes observed in the Bay Area and San Diego, total employment — a government statistic that includes the self-employed and gig economy workers — plunged …