In recent years, movie production companies and movie streaming services have reacted to the developments of an increasingly global world, in particular the need for subtitling in foreign languages. They offer more and more movie titles in more than one language for an increasingly multi-language audience.
One would assume that this is good news for translators. Indeed, subtitling is an established subgenre of the translation business. There are some extremely good translators who have specialized in that field. Unfortunately, this type of translation has historically not been paying well, despite a rising need, which is the reason why many well-qualified translators are not working in subtitle translation.
The low rates that movie companies offer for that type of work has created a shortage in translators who are actively working in this field. Many experienced professional translators and many of those just entering the profession would pursue a career in that area, if they were able to make a comfortable living by doing so. In a recent article in the Guardian, the current situation is described as follows:
“…despite their crucial and highly skilled role, acting as conduits between the action on screen and millions of viewers around the world, the translators who painstakingly write the streamers’ subtitles – some of whom may be paid as little as $1 (75p) per minute of programme time – do not appear to have seen the rewards filtering down to them.”
Read more here: https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2021/nov/14/where-have-all-the-translators-gone