Rashida Tlaib Wants Streaming Royalty Reform for Artists

Rashida Tlaib is calling for musicians to get paid for their music by proposing a new streaming royalty program.

Michigan Democrat Representative Rashida Tlaib is on the side of music creators. According to Rolling Stone, Tlaib has proposed a Congressional Resolution that calls for a new streaming royalty program that will provide direct pay to musicians. In a letter, Tlaib gave notice to her colleagues about the proposal, which will support musicians to improve economic circumstances throughout the United States.

“While the music industry has experienced an economic revival with the success of streaming music services like Spotify and Apple Music, the current lack of regulation or codified streaming music royalty program has driven a race to the bottom,” Tlaib wrote in her letter, according to a press release. “Streaming music platforms’ payouts per stream are minuscule, and declining each year—leaving working musicians with little of the income generated by these platforms.”

The letter comes following Tlaib's work with nonprofit organization Union of Musicians and Allied Workers, whose goal is to “to organize music workers to fight for a more just music industry, and to join with other workers in the struggle for a better society.”

“When we met [with UMAW] it was really clear how efforts to pay musicians fairly for their work tied in to so many different threads of justice we were already working on,” Tlaib said to Rolling Stone. “This is a step in the direction of creating a streaming royalty that pays musicians fairly for their labor.”

Joey La Neve DeFrancesco, musician and co-founder of UMAW, added in a statement, “UMAW has been working toward legislation for over two years. Tech giants like Apple, Amazon, Spotify, and others have sent music industry profits skyrocketing, but working musicians aren’t seeing any of that money. It’s time that we get our fair share.”