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A Dancer…
She dances with big-time singers and bands.
She choreographs for these bands and singers.
She is invited all over the world to teach master classes.
She creates a special summer dance training event that attracts dancers from all over the world.
She opens her own dance studio.
She creates dance companies to train the next generation of dancers who land TV jobs and go on tour around the world.
Covid19 hits.
She is forced to close her studio.
She is forced to pay rent on a space she is forced to close.
She has no dance class or training program income.
She has no tour income because the U.S. is banned from travel and all concerts are cancelled.
She has no master class income because the U.S. is banned from travel.
She has no income from her summer training event because her studio is closed and the U.S. is infested with COVID19 cases.
She is still waiting for EIDL.
She applied for PPP when they opened this last round and is still waiting.
She has applied to every small grant like a scavenger and not won any of them.
The only thing keeping her alive and the studio from going out of business is unemployment.
Unemployment is a fraction of what she normally makes.
Unemployment doesn’t cover her mortgage and rent on her studio.
She has a deferment on her mortgage so she can pay her dance studio some rent in case, by some miracle, she doesn’t go out of business.
She can’t “get back to work” because everything is closed.
She can’t “get back to work” because she has no job to go back to.
Her life has been ruined by COVID19.
This one dance studio fills apartment buildings and hotels, restaurants, bars, coffee houses, grocery stores, local transportation and other local businesses and services.
This one dance studio helps sustain our local economy filled with small businesses.
Do nothing and our economy collapses, one neighborhood at a time.
The least Congress can do for their inaction and for trivializing the severity of Covid19 is to extend the federal unemployment assistance.
If they do not, they are harming U.S. citizens’ right to survival.
If they do not, they are taking away U.S. citizens’ ability to be creative, innovative and artistic.
If they do not, they are harming U.S. small businesses that fuel our economy.
If they do not, they are taking away our American dream.