Why does Hollywood have a low median income? (Los Angeles, Burbank: middle-class, section 8)

[homenj]

I was wondering why Hollywood’s median income is so low. I looked at it on the latimes website and it says it is about $35,000 a year. I know the wealthier people live in Hollywood Hills but isn’t Hollywood still prime real estate in LA? I mean it attracts a lot of tourists, still has a lot of amenities, has a great location, accessible to the metro that makes you to the downtown area, and doesn’t resemble the typical lower income neighborhood in la. Why is the median income so low?

[socal88]

The term "Hollywood" is used very loosely.

The media and others will talk about celebs and other wealthy folks living in Hollywood. This will often refer to folks who lives in wealthy neighborhoods that can include Hollywood Hills, Los Feliz, etc.

The geographical boundaries of the Hollywood neighborhood as defined by LA Times and generally other sources solely includes the flat areas that is approximately defined as bound between Franklin and Melrose (from north to south) and from Fairfax to Western (east to west). This area is apartment heavy (with many older apartments and some new) and of the remainder consists of postage stamp lots with small homes that tend to be run down. In essence, Hollywood is somewhere around lower middle-class with some parts that are just flat out poor. Lots of working class folks and you've got a fair share of struggling actors and other entertainment folks just barely getting by. Go further towards East Hollywood especially and you'll see it's just not that great.

If Hollywood keeps re-developing where old apartments are torn down to make way for new, high-end apartments that attract folks with high five-figure to low six-figure salaries, you'll see the dynamics change. But in the meantime, while Hollywood is accessible to the metro and has amenities, a lot of it is a smokescreen as there is a lot of homelessness and the area is still fairly grungy and run down.

[jm1982]

Agree with poster above . I lived in Hollywood for a bit . My building and the entire block seemed to be all elderly/retired Eastern Europeans and Russians . I heard many are actually on section 8 .
I lived there in 2009/2010 and have seen there’s been quite a bit of change since then . several of the older buildings I used to live on have been redeveloped into newer luxury buildings . They were 1950s type dingbats before .

Still a lot of older apartments with lower income tenants .

Change happens slow in L.A due to rent control and the difficulty , cost and time to develop property.
There are buildings now that have plans to redevelop but you wouldn’t know it just by looking at them . It can take years and years especially for larger projects.

It is gritty not skid row gritty but you have quite a few homeless crazies and dirty streets.
My rent wasn’t too crazy back then but I know those new buildings now are real expensive doesn’t seem a great value to me . I’d rather be next door in Studio City or in Burbank ... but different strokes ..

[saybanana]

Above Sunset Blvd, there has been a lot of development esp of more lux type of establishments and housing. But south of Sunset has not seen a lot of development. South and east of the 101 freeway. Youll find a lot of immigrants in these areas. Also pensioners, Lower income, low education, some low english language skills.

Will it be prime real estate? For developers who can afford to build huge apartment complexes or hotels, maybe, but there are not much SFH available. Most are small apartment complexes. While rents are high, many of these apartments are rent control so it isnt driving away all the poor. IT will likely stay a lower income areas for those already there with a slight income average over time.

[eureka1]

Some of the oldsters who have been there for decades have interesting tales to tell.

[homenj]

Thanks for the replies. They were very informative and I got responses quickly. Thank you for that!

I feel that Hollywood is lower income because two groups form large segments of the population

Immigrants who work in low wage jobs. Hollywood is the perfect place for them to live in bc it has a large service oriented industry because of stores, restaurants, hotels, etc nearby.

Struggling artists and actors. Think Penny from the “Big Bang Theory.”

[Eumaois]

On use of "Hollywood": the loose use ofof "Hollywood" is a case of metonymy, which Wikipedia defines as "a figure of speech in which a thing or concept is referred to by the name of something closely associated with that thing or concept." It's a metonym for the Amer. film industry.

google.com/maps/place/Hollywood,+Los+Angeles,+CA/@34.06275,-118.3100421,13z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x80c2bf07045279bf:0xf67a9a6797bdf ae4!8m2!3d34.0928092!4d-118.3286614 is the geographic part of L.A. that is Hollywood (the purplish-pink shaded area).

Per its Wikipedia article, "The sign was erected in 1923 and originally read 'HOLLYWOODLAND.' Its purpose was to advertise the name of a new segregated housing development in the hills above the Hollywood district of Los Angeles. H.J. Whitley had already used a sign to advertise his development Whitley Heights, which was located between Highland Avenue and Vine Street. He suggested to his friend Harry Chandler, the owner of the Los Angeles Times newspaper, that the land syndicate in which he was involved make a similar sign to advertise their land.[4] Real estate developers Woodruff and Shoults called their development 'Hollywoodland' and advertised it as a 'superb environment without excessive cost on the Hollywood side of the hills.'[5]". This can account in part for associating the Hollywood sign with the Amer. movie industry.

Paramount Pictures is currently the only major Amer. movie studio actually in Hollywood proper. The other big 5 are 20th Century Fox, Walt Disney Pictures, Columbia Pictures (sometimes represented as "Sony Pictures"), Universal Pictures, and Warner Bros Pictures). So, a movie filmed at Paramount is a Hollywood movie in the sense of being filmed in Hollywood proper.

A brief overview on the founding of Tinseltown as a neighborhood/community: H.J. Whitley was the main architect lead the development much of the Hollywood infrastructure. He and wife, Margaret Virginia Ross Stanley, were the main founding parents of Hollywood (as a town or neighborhood). However, they didn't register the name or start Hollywood as a modern community. Harvey Wilcox and Daeida Wilcox-Beveridge did that. Harvey Wilcox and Daeida Wilcox-Beveridge formed it with the hopes of a conservative Christian prohibition community. They registered the name around 8/1886 then it was in October the same year the name got approved (those specific dates are from info I got from the website of and through an e-mail exchange with the great-granddaughter of H.J. Whitley, Gaelyn Whitley-Keith).