Los Angeles County has lost over 19,000 jobs in the arts, entertainment and recreation industry since February of this year, just before the coronavirus pandemic hit, according to updated figures released by the LA Controller.
On Monday, LA Controller Ron Galperin shared that Los Angeles recently regained 16,000 jobs in the month of May, but the city is still down 252,000 jobs overall dating back to February.
In arts, entertainment and recreation, one of the hardest hit areas, Galperin estimates that 19,294 jobs in total have been lost according to the updated data.
A previous chart with data from April that was released last month showed that in April, the arts, entertainment and recreation industry saw a dip in employment of 39%, with the new data for May showing that it fell by an additional 3%. The only industry hit harder in April than the entertainment space was accommodation and food service.
“Although unemployment in Los Angeles is still over 20%, we’ve started to regain jobs in certain industries,” Galperin said in a statement. “This is a positive sign for thousands of families, but it remains to be seen whether the trend will continue. There are still many neighborhoods in Los Angeles, especially those with higher concentrations of African American and Latino families, immigrants, low-income renters and single-parent households, that will need additional resources to recover from COVID-19.”
The data also shows that the Los Angeles County unemployment rate increased dramatically in March and April and through May are above both California and national levels at above 20%, even surpassing those from the Great Recession.
See the full interactive chart of data across all industries here.