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In early June, Dave Margulies, owner and producer of High Sierra Music Festival, was working on a printed pocket guide with a show schedule, which organizers will hand out to attendees of the more than 30-year-old Quincy, California, event. That there even would be a festival to navigate this year wasn’t a foregone conclusion. Margulies says the festival used to sell about 7,000 tickets annually; in 2023 and 2024, it sold about 4,500 each year. “It almost sent us into bankruptcy,” he says. Independent festivals like High Sierra have been hit particularly hard, but their main challengeslumping ticket salesis shared by big-name events. Coachellawhich the past few years has welcomed more than 200,000 attendees over its two weekendsused to sell out in just hours. This year, resellers like StubHub had tickets available for less than face value shortly ahead of the event’s first weekend in mid-April. Recent attendance is also less than half of the number who attended the event in 2014. For 2025, Margulies significantly changed how he curated the lineup to curb costs. He did not book high-dollar headliners like Robert Plant, Jason Isbell, and Sturgill Simpson, who all have played the festival in the past, and instead focused on smaller acts like Molly Tuttle, a Grammy-nominated bluegrass guitarist, and the up-and-coming jam band Dogs in a Pile. Flagging ticket salesand rising costs for artists and organizersare putting unprecedented pressure on festivals’ bottom line. And in such a challenging environment, smaller festivals are becoming a canary in the coal mine for the larger industry. “This is really a make-or-break year,” Margulies says. High Sierra, 2024. [Photo: Susan J Weiand] Rising pricesfor everyone In 2006 in Chicago, Mike Reed, a drummer and event producer, founded Pitchfork Music Festival with the eponymous digital music site. The initial focus was on booking such indie acts as Andrew Bird and The Decemberists. The landscape for festivals was really bare, Reed says. He curated the lineup based on Pitchforks best new music lists, and the event grew to attract about 60,000 fans and sold out each year until 2017, when the specialness of the event started to wear off, Reed said. That’s when the focus shifted to booking larger acts from more genresincluding Kendrick Lamar and Chance the Rappermoving away from just indie artists. Reed says that focus, and the accompanying cost of booking big-name artists, led Pitchfork parent Condé Nast to announce in November 2024 that it would be discontinuing the festival. For a headliner like Lamar in 2014, organizers paid $325,000; a few years earlier, the cost of a headliner was $70,000, Reed says. Those costs have only ballooned further since the pandemic, in part because of how much touring now costs for artists. A general view of the atmosphere following the cancellation of the 2025 Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival on June 13, 2025 in Manchester, Tennessee. [Photo: Josh Brasted/WireImage/Getty Images] Hank Sacks, a booking agent with Partisan Arts, which works with artists like Jack Johnson, and Big Head Todd and the Monsters, says renting a tour bus now costs twice as much as it did before the pandemic, said. That expense then factors into artists’ appearance fees. Those costs have trickled down to the consumer, said Sacks. Insurance premiums also increased between 25% and 40%, depending on the event, according to Steven Perlini, president of Wise Risk, which has insured many of the largest festivals in the United States. In 2015, a three-day general admission ticket to Coachella cost $375. This year, a ticket to the first weekend cost $649 and for the second weekend, $599. Those costs could continue to rise because of climate change, which has increased the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events. This year, Bonnaroo organizers canceled the festival after one day this year because the area had received one inch of rain, and forecasts suggested ongoing precipitation would make campingand leavingharder if the festival kept fans around. If scientists forecast proves accurate and the amount of drenching rains and wildfires increases, that would lead to higher rates, higher deductibles, and more restrictive policy conditions, and those costs would then trickle down to consumers, Perlini said If your costs are going up, the only way to make it profitable is for you to increase your revenues by charging more for tickets,” Perlini said. [Photo: Valerie Macon/AFP/Getty Images] Sales slump, festivals close In 2023, there were at least 48 festival cancellations, according to Music Festival Wizard, a publication that tracks the events. The next year, there were 95 cancellations, some of them at that last minute, leaving fans angry. So far this year, there have been at least 45. Those who still play, organize, and attend festivals say events being canceled due to low sales take away the opportunity for like-minded music fans to come together around their favorite artists. I’m a huge fan of making a pilgrimage to distant locales because it just changes the way that you witness the world, and that’s what the music festival is there to do,” says Grace Potter, a Grammy-nominated musicians who has played festivals of all sizes, and organizes Grand North Point festival in Vermont. The cause is often the samelow sales making the cost of putting on an event untenable. Thievery Corporation performs during the 2016 High Sierra Music Festival at Plumas County Fairgrounds in Quincy, California. [Photo: C Flanigan/WireImage/Getty Images] One bright spot has been EDM. Fueled by 6% year-over-year growth in 2024, the electronic music industry hit $12.9 billion last year, according to entertainment analysis firm Midia Research. Flagship festival Electric Daisy Belgian festival Tomorrowland sold out this year, and U.S. events Ultra and EDC regularly sell out well in advance. But across the wider industry, Midia notes that the global music industry’s revenue growth slowed in 2024, due in part to a slowdown in ticket sales after an initial post-pandemic boom. Consumers have less disposable income to spend on entertainment, so its put the festivals under a lot of pressure, says Vito Valentinetti, Music Festival Wizard cofounder and editor-in-chief. Music fans’ budgets have tightened amid a 55% increase in the cost of general admission festival tickets between 2014 and 2024an issue that’s been exacerbated by the rising cost of doing business for artists and organizers. Whereas owners of a festival like Coachella can weather a downturn, some of them just dont have the money to ride it out, said Valentinetti, of Music Festival Wizard. Ahead of this weekend, Margulies, of High Sierra, was hopeful the event would once again sell 4,500 tickets as he spent less on artists to keep tickets at their $392 price point. Despite telling Fast Company in early June that he had no plans to cancel the event, Margulies seemed to flirt with the idea of canceling by the middle of the month, telling a local news outlet that record-low ticket sales forced him to reconsider. The story helped sell enough tickets that he decided to continue with this year’s event. I’m just hoping that we can make ends meet so we get to do it again next year,” he says.
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E-Commerce
U.S. Senate Republicans pushed President Donald Trump’s sweeping tax cut and spending bill forward on Sunday in a marathon weekend session even as a nonpartisan forecaster said it would add an estimated $3.3 trillion to the nation’s debt over a decade. The estimate by the Congressional Budget Office of the bill’s hit to the $36.2 trillion federal debt is about $800 billion more than the version passed last month in the House of Representatives. Senators are scheduled to start voting on a potentially long list of amendments to the bill beginning at 9 a.m. EDT (1400 GMT) Monday. Republicans, who have long voiced concern about growing U.S. deficits and debt, have rejected the CBO’s longstanding methodology to calculate the cost of legislation. Democrats, meanwhile, hope the latest, eye-widening figure could stoke enough anxiety among fiscally minded conservatives to get them to buck their party, which controls both chambers of Congress. Republicans are doing something the Senate has never, never done before, deploying fake math and accounting gimmicks to hide the true cost of the bill,” Democratic Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said as debate opened on Sunday. “Republicans are about to pass the single most expensive bill in U.S. history, to give tax breaks to billionaires while taking away Medicaid, SNAP benefits and good paying jobs for millions of people.” The Senate only narrowly advanced the tax-cut, immigration, border and military spending bill in a procedural vote late on Saturday, voting 5149 to open debate on the 940-page megabill. Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, one of two Republicans who voted to block the bill, explained his position in a speech to the Senate, saying White House aides had failed to give Trump proper advice about the legislation’s Medicaid cuts. “What do I tell 663,00 people in two years, three years, when President Trump breaks his promise by pushing them off of Medicaid because the funding’s not there anymore,” Tillis said, referring to his constituents. Trump on social media hailed Saturday’s vote as a “great victory” for his “great, big, beautiful bill.” In a separate post on Sunday, he said: “We will make it all up, times 10, with GROWTH, more than ever before.” In an illustration of the depths of the divide within the Republican Party over the bill, Tillis said he would not seek re-election next year, after Trump threatened to back a primary challenger in retribution for Tillis’ Saturday night vote against the bill. On Sunday, Trump celebrated Tillis’ announcement as “Great News!” on Truth Social and issued a warning to fellow Republicans who have concerns over the bill. “REMEMBER, you still have to get reelected. Dont go too crazy!” Trump wrote in a post. Tillis’ North Carolina seat is one of the few Republican Senate seats seen as vulnerable in next year’s midterm elections. Trump wants the bill passed before the July 4 Independence Day holiday. While that deadline is one of choice, lawmakers will face a far more serious deadline later this summer when they must raise the nation’s self-imposed debt ceiling or risk a devastating default on $36.2 trillion in debt. HITS TO BENEFITS Senator Mark Warner, a Democrat from Virginia, said this legislation would come to haunt Republicans if it gets approved, predicting 16 million Americans would lose their health insurance. “Many of my Republican friends know . . . they’re walking the plank on this and we’ll see if those who’ve expressed quiet consternation will actually have the courage of their convictions,” Warner told CBS News’ “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan.” The legislation has been the sole focus of a marathon weekend congressional session marked by political drama, division and lengthy delays as Democrats seek to slow the legislation’s path to passage. Schumer called for the entire text of the bill to be read on the Senate floor, a process that began before midnight Saturday and ran well into Sunday afternoon. Following up to 20 hours of debate on the legislation, the Senate will enter an amendment session, known as a “vote-a-rama,” before voting on passage. Lawmakers said they hoped to complete work on the bill on Monday. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, the other Republican “no” vote, opposed the legislation because it would raise the federal borrowing limit by an additional $5 trillion. The megabill would extend the 2017 tax cuts that were Trump’s main legislative achievement during his first term as president, cut other taxes and boost spending on the military and border security. Senate Republicans, who reject the CBO’s estimates on the cost of the legislation, are set on using an alternative calculation method that does not factor in costs from extending the 2017 tax cuts. Outside tax experts, like Andrew Lautz from the nonpartisan think tank Bipartisan Policy Center, call it a “magic trick.” Using this calculation method, the Senate Republicans budget bill appears to cost substantially less and seems to save $500 billion, according to the BPC analysis. If the Senate passes the bill, it will then return to the House of Representatives for final passage before Trump can sign it into law. The House passed its version of the bill last month. Bo Erickson and Phil Stewart, Reuters
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E-Commerce
Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill are working to pass President Trumps controversial One Big Beautiful Bill Act. A marathon session of voting in the U.S. Senate, known in Washington as a “vote-o-rama,” is expected to begin on Monday, according to CNN. But just what is in the bill, when will it become law, and how do Americans feel about it? Heres what you need to know. Whats in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act? This isnt an easy one to answer simply because the One Big Beautiful Bill Act is so large. In its current form, it spans around 940 pages and is packed with everything from tax breaks for the rich to changes to Medicare to defense spending. Few people have actually read the entire One Big Beautiful Bill Actincluding many of the Senators who are expected to vote on it this week. And thats a bad thing, because when new laws are this sprawling and the changes so sweeping, they often result in unforeseen negative impacts. There are at least hundreds of changes to U.S. law in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, but some of the most dramatic changes revolve around tax cuts for the rich, largely paid for by cuts to Medicaid, the health insurance program designed to provide healthcare to Americas most poor and needy. Citing estimates from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), PBS has a good rundown of some of the major elements of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Some of those elements are: $3.8 trillion in tax cuts, with the wealthy and corporations benefiting the most. $350 billion for border and national security spending. Medicaid and other government healthcare and social services cuts would result in 10.9 million Americans losing their health insurance coverage, and 3 million Americans losing their access to food stamps. The elimination of a $200 tax on gun silencers. A provision that would deter individual U.S. states from regulating artificial intelligence. $40 million in funding to establish a National Garden of American Heroes. When will the One Big Beautiful Bill Act become law? There are several remaining steps that the bill needs to go through to become law. Earlier this month, the House passed its version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. However, Senate Republicans disagreed with many elements of the House version of the bill and have been making revisions to it in their chamber. Those revisions are ongoing. Meanwhile, President Trump has also set an arbitrary timeline for when he desired the One Big Beautiful Bill Act to be passed. The deadline Trump stated is Friday, July 4. Yet it is precisely this artificial deadline that has many worrying that lawmakers will not take the time they need to fully examine the bill’s elements and consider the long-term consequences it may have on Americans. Republicans, of course, may still not agree on a new version of the bill, which could mean that Trumps July 4 deadline could come and go. For now, here’s what you may be able to expect as far as a timeline this week, per CNN: Republicans need to get their party holdouts to support the One Big Beautiful Bill Act as it currently stands, or make changes to it that will satisfy the holdouts. This process may be completed on Monday, or it could stretch for several days. Meanwhile, Democrats, who all universally oppose the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, will have their clerks read out the bill in Congress; this is estimated to take 10 to 15 hours due to the length of the bill and is being used as a stalling tactic. If any Republican Senators stick around for the bills reading, it may be the first time some of them have actually heard what is in the entire 940-page bill. A debate on the bill will follow the Democrats’ reading of the bill. A vote-a-rama will then take place on the bill. This is where Senators vote on amendments to it. A lot of this vote-a-rama will involve political theater, and as CNN notes, Democrats will likely use Republican Senators’ votes during this process in campaign attack ads during the midterm elections next year. Finally, there will be a vote on passing the final One Big Beautiful Bill Act into law. No Democrats are expected to support the bill, and there may even be a few Republican holdouts, but it is believed that Republicans will still have enough votes in the Senate to pass it. However, just because the Senate passes the One Big Beautiful Bill Act doesnt mean it becomes law. The bill would then need to return to the House for a vote. If it passes the House, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act would then become law with the president’s signature. As for whether all this can be accomplished by July 4, that remains to be seen. What do Americans think of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act Most Americans dont like the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, including many Republicans and even self-identified MAGA supporters. The nonpartisan nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) released the results of its comprehensive polling on the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on June 17. Those results showed that an overwhelming majority of Americans viewed the bill unfavorably. When KFF asked Americans if they had a favorable or unfavorable opinion of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the results were clear: 64% of Americans have an unfavorable view of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act That unfavorability number jumps to 85% of Americans who identify as Democrats Among Independent voters, 71% of Americans view the bill unfavorably But whats really interesting is the view of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act from Americans who identify themselves as Republicans: While KFF found that just 36% of Republicans view the One Big Beautiful Bill Act unfavorably, that number is massively different depending on whether the Republican identifies themselves as a MAGA supporter or a non-MAGA supporter. Yet even among MAGA supporters, more than a quarter of them27%view the One Big Beautiful Bill Act unfavorably. And when it comes to non-MAGA Republicans, the numbers are much worse. A full 66% of non-MAGA Republicans view the One Big Beautiful Bill Act unfavorably. If so many American voters across parties view the One Big Beautiful Bill Act unfavorably, why are Republicans rushing to pass the bill? Thats a question theyll have to answer to their Republican voters during next years Midterm elections.
Category:
E-Commerce
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