Music and Film Industries Drop More Than 30,000 Jobs during 2014 According to Bureau of Labor Statistics

We've spoken often about the drop in album sales in recent years and recent weeks so it's sadly not all that surprising that the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that more than 30,000 jobs were lost between the music and motion picture industries since the beginning of the year, bringing the total number employed within those industries to just less than 300,000 according to Billboard.

The numbers indicate an 8 percent drop in the year since August 2013, which only continues the cumulative 19 percent drop since August of 2012. The Bureau's numbers suggest that things were relatively calm before December of 2013, before somewhere in between 10,000 and 20,000 jobs were lost in the next few months.

It's tough to break the numbers down specifically for the music industry as the BLS only releases data for the two industries combined. We can presume however that most of the music employees lost were under the category of "audio and video equipment technicians" and "producers and directors," which make up around 44,000 jobs between them as of 2013.

There is some good news however. The job cuts seem to result in more work for those who've retained employment in their respective industries, as the average salary has risen from $27.50 an hour to $29.20 an hour between July 2013 and July 2014. As the Gershwin brothers might say, it's nice work if you can get it.

It's tough to correlate a drop in music sales to cutbacks in music media, SPIN announced today that it would be letting go of 19 employees from its holding Vibe and also that it would cut the print version of the magazine. SPIN cut its own print version during 2012.