The Fight to Get You To Pay Continues

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musicFIRST Coalition President Chris Israel wrote an opinion piece for The Hill this week to champion the latest piece of legislation, “The Fair Play Fair Pay Act,” which, if passed, would result in radio stations having to pay to play music. Israel writes, “Broadcast radio is a $17 billion industry where 10 mega-corporations are responsible for about half of the revenue that’s generated using artists’ songs. They get away with paying artists nothing for their work by perpetuating an antiquated theory that performers should just be grateful that radio is taking their music (without their permission) and ‘promoting’ them.”

Israel believes The Fair Play Fair Pay Act will also benefit the economy. “In addition to the lost domestic income resulting from the lack of an FM performance right, our broken system puts American music creators at a disadvantage because it denies them performance royalties when their songs receive international airplay. This loss for performers is estimated to cost the U.S. economy more than $200 million a year. Continuing with this status quo makes zero sense from an economic standpoint, which is another reason why there is growing momentum for lawmakers to pass copyright reform in the 115th Congress.”

And Israel believes progress is being made in getting this type of legislation on the books. “Sentiment has long been on the side of music artists on Capitol Hill. The last few weeks have seen a significant wave of support in Congress for modernizing our copyright system in a way that protects artists’ creative rights. In today’s hyper-partisan Washington, it’s encouraging that members of Congress are reaching across the aisle to champion the value of music and assert that music creators deserve to be paid for their hard work, especially when others are making a profit from it.”

Read Chris Israel’s column in The Hill HERE.

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