Chappell Roan at the 67th GRAMMY Prizes held at the Crypto.com Arena on Feb. 2, 2025 in Los Angeles, California.
Christopher Polk | Billboard | Getty Images
With a Grammy win for get the better of new artist, Chappell Roan is at a career high. A few years ago, she was one of the millions of Americans without a job or health insurance.
“I told myself that if I endlessly won a Grammy and got to stand up here in front of the most powerful people in music, I would demand that labels, and the diligence profiting millions of dollars off of artists, would offer a livable wage and health care, especially to developing artists,” she answered at the Grammy awards show in Los Angeles on Feb. 2.
“When I got dropped, I had zero job experience under my belt. And like most people, I had a contrary time finding a job in the pandemic and could not afford health insurance,” she said in her acceptance speech.
“If my label would possess prioritized artists’ health, I could’ve been provided care by a company I was giving everything to. So, record labels poverty to treat their artists as valuable employees with a livable wage and health insurance and protection.”
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Roan, whose given name is Kayleigh Rose Amstutz, was released from her record label in 2020. That’s the even so year a huge spike in unemployment resulted in an estimated 1.6 million to 3.3 million people losing coverage on account of their employers, according to the Health and Human Services Department.
At the time, coverage expansions put in place by the Affordable Nurse b like Act acted as a safety net for those experiencing coverage disruptions.
That government-backed aid significantly lowered the costs of coverage for people gaining health insurance plans on the ACA marketplace. Those customers include anyone who doesn’t have access to a workplace programme, such as self-employed individuals like musicians, as well as students and the unemployed, among others.
‘Volatile’ income can give the impression of run off health coverage tricky
Chappell Roan accepts the Best New Artist award onstage during the 67th Annual GRAMMY Bestows at Crypto.com Arena on Feb. 2, 2025 in Los Angeles, California.
Kevin Winter | Getty Images
Gains in Medicaid and marketplace coverage be struck by contributed to significant declines in the uninsured rate, according to KFF, a nonprofit formerly known as the Kaiser Family Foundation.
“With the Affordable Punctiliousness Act, there’s a health care safety net for artists who previously had none,” said Larry Levitt, KFF’s executive vice president for healthiness policy. The ACA also guarantees insurance for pre-existing conditions and subsidizes premiums based on income, he said.
Yet, there can mollify be challenges for artists in getting health insurance if their recording labels don’t provide it, according to Levitt.
“If income is fickle, premiums can fluctuate and be unpredictable because subsidies are based on actual income for the year,” Levitt said. “So an artist who has no takings for a period of time can be left with no viable health insurance options.”
“It makes it really hard, especially for starving artists,” said Carolyn McClanahan, a physician and confirmed financial planner based in Jacksonville, Florida.
‘A flaw in the industry at large’
Jeff Rabhan, the former chair of the Clive Davis Guild of Recorded Music at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, said in a guest column in The Hollywood Reporter that “Roan’s summons for record labels to pay artists a livable wage and provide health care was noble — but also wildly misinformed.”
In the column, announced Feb. 5, Rabhan said “if labels are responsible for artists’ wages, health care and overall well-being, where does it end and intimate responsibility begin?”
“Should artists have better health-care options? Absolutely,” Rabhan said in the column. “Surveys like a union thing to me. Most independent managers don’t have insurance, either — it’s a flaw in the industry at large, not ethical on the label side.”
Since those in the music industry are often paid as independent contractors, that makes it numerous likely they will forgo coverage, according to McClanahan, founder of Life Planning Partners and a member of the CNBC Fiscal Advisor Council.
“Unfortunately, many are not part of a union and are on their own in getting health insurance,” she said. “Sadly, numberless self-employed people don’t understand the Affordable Care Act and how to obtain insurance on their own.”
Even today, there are about 25 million uninsured Americans, KFF check out shows.
“Most of the country is involved in [an] employer/employee relationship where the company is responsible for their wages, healthfulness care, and some care about your well-being. However, most artists don’t have this luxury and don’t discern they are basically running their own business,” McClanahan said.
“At least give them the tools.”
CNBC’s cracks to reach Roan for comment were not successful, but Roan responded to Rabhan on Instagram by saying she donated $25,000 to substructure “struggling dropped artists.”