Los Angeles at a Glance

Working in Los Angeles

The City of Angels is also a City of Superlatives.

Everyone associates working in Los Angeles with Hollywood – but is that all there is to working in Los Angeles? Of course not! InterNations gives you a short insight into the local economy and job market and helps you get to grips with the US tax and social security system.

Working in Los Angeles: A City of Superlatives

LA is, in many ways, a city of superlatives: Thanks to Hollywood, it has achieved worldwide renown as the Entertainment Capital of the World – and not only with regard to motion pictures. The music, TV production and video game industries are of similar importance to people working in Los Angeles. With one in every six residents working in Los Angeles’s creative industries, another superlative commonly used to describe the city seems totally justified: the “Creative Capital of the World”.

With approximately half a million people working in Los Angeles’s manufacturing industry, the city also boasts the largest manufacturing base in the country. The Port of Los Angeles guarantees another pole position for LA: It is the most significant port in the Western Hemisphere for trade in the Pacific Basin, and it receives nearly half of all U.S. waterborne containerized imports.

While we’re on the topic of superlatives, here are some more statistical facts that may be of interest to expats working in Los Angeles: The LA metropolitan area is the most ethnically diverse in the country; Los Angeles has more museums per capita than any other city in the world; traffic congestion is higher than anywhere else in the US; and the 2^nd largest Mormon temple in the world can be found in LA. Last but not least, and despite decreasing crime statistics, the large numbers of organized street criminals working in Los Angeles have earned the city the name of Gang Capital of America.

Working in Los Angeles: The Economic Picture

LA is a regional and global business and economic center. For people working in Los Angeles, this means they are part of the economy of the world’s third richest city. Big contributors to LA’s economic success are international trade, entertainment, aerospace, technology, petroleum, fashion, apparel and tourism. LA also has one of the largest retail markets in the country.

Expats working in Los Angeles are often employed by one of the big international corporations operating in the fields of engineering, aerospace, petroleum, real estate and construction. Media production, finance, telecommunications, law, health care and transportation also figure as major employers for people working in Los Angeles.

Working in Los Angeles: The Job Market

The biggest obstacle to working in Los Angeles is the work permit issue. Basically, if you do not already have a visa and work permit for the US, the road to working in Los Angeles can be a long and stony one. Not only does your future US employer have to apply and pay for your visa and work permit, but he or she also has to get approval from the US Department of Labor. For more information, please refer to our articles on moving to Los Angeles and moving to the US.

Employees of multinational corporations with branch offices in the US stand the best chances of working in Los Angeles. If you cannot count on an intra-company transfer to provide you with the opportunity of working in Los Angeles, try the traditional way of searching for job ads on the Internet and in the local, regional and national press, such as the Los Angeles Times.

Alternatively, contact the US Chamber of Commerce in your country of residence to get contact details of companies operating in the LA area. Sending out speculative applications or letters of introduction may in fact get you a long way towards working in Los Angeles, as only about one third of jobs on the US labor market are advertised. Recommended reading for people interested in working in Los Angeles includes the Occupational Outlook Handbook or other publications by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.