So you have big dreams of making it in the movies, right? Are you ready to move to LA to make it happen? Even if you aren’t seeking fame and stardom, Los Angeles has a bustling economy where bedrock American industries thrive right next to the innovation of the future. Yet, even if you aren’t the next Tom Hanks or Julia Roberts, Southern California might just be the place for you to build a career.
From the Gold Rush era to the film industry and all the way through to the Silicon Valley tech boom, California has always been a land with promises of plenty, where dreamers could come to stake their claim. It takes brave souls, and those with what they call it in the movies, “moxie” to raise their stakes and head west with a head full of dreams. If you are nervous and uncertain about making the move, relax, you are definitely not alone. Once you make the move to LA you’ll find compatriots in the struggle and hustle. Los Angeles enables a lifestyle where many people live one gig to the next and hustle until they make it. For those in entertainment, the cyclical cycle of production means people get used to long spans of unemployment between jobs. Reflective of this, Los Angeles has slightly higher unemployment rates than the national average, but wages are higher on average as well. (1) But everyone who has made it has one thing they have in common: there was a time they took a risk, gambled on themselves and made a leap of faith to move to Los Angeles.
Many people found an “anchor job” to get them to LA, but it is getting easier in today’s economy to get off the bus and get right to work. Making the move to Los Angeles, you are going to need to moor your ship to a dock pretty quickly. An anchor job is a traditional way to transition from one city or region to another. This is a chance to give yourself a break, take a job that you might be overqualified or uninterested in. They say “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know” and this is definitely true of L.A. Think of a job opportunity where you might get to know people like a café or casual dining restaurant. The old cliché of actors waiting tables still holds true, virtually everyone you meet in the service sector of Southern California has a passion or calling they pursue with vigor when they aren’t delivering avocado toast to your table.
The Los Angeles economy is larger than that of states like Taiwan and Saudi Arabia (2), with all that money going around there is plenty of opportunity to find temp work too. There are temp Staffing Agencies in Los Angeles County that cover nearly every economic sector. Whether blue collar or white collar work is your forte, you’ll find nationally recognized agencies like Manpower and AppleOne as well as agencies that focus on the entertainment industry, like 80 Twenty and The Creative Group. If you are an actor, or really in any entertainment related vocation, consider signing up with one of the many casting agencies like Central Casting. (3) It is easy to pick up a nice check for a day’s work clapping in a studio audience or standing in the background of a TV or movie scene. Pursuing work through temp staffing agencies in Los Angeles County will allow you to meet new people, try your hand at various jobs and these opportunities often lead to career defining gigs.
In the age of the internet, the gig economy is booming, which is especially true in Los Angeles County where gig related work generates more than $18 billion dollars per year. (4) If you have specific talents, you can start to generate income on sites like Fiverr or Redbubble, selling your specific skills, before you even make the move. Apps like Lyft or Postmates enable you to rideshare or deliver goods and it is quick and easy to get started driving. With some hustle, you can generate a nice income through the gig economy while you wait for that dream career to kick in. No matter what you do or what your dreams are, Los Angeles County has a bustling economy which is as sunny as its skies. Bring your talents and your dreams and pursue temp work until you make it.
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