A group of ten music industry organizations formally opposed a proposed 43% average increase to copyright registration fees, arguing the hike would lock out independent creators out of the registration system.
The American Association of Independent Music (A2IM) led the filing of the opposition with the US Copyright Office on Monday (May 4), joined by the Artist Rights Alliance, Music Managers Forum–US, The Recording Academy, the Society of Composers & Lyricists (SCL), Songwriters of North America (SONA), the Songwriters Guild of America (SGA), Music Artists Coalition (MAC), the American Federation of Musicians (AFM), and the Future of Music Coalition.
The groups collectively represent more than 600 independent record labels and tens of thousands of musicians, songwriters, and artist managers.
The filing was in response to the Copyright Office’s proposed fee schedule published in March 2026. The proposal reflects historic inflation since the last fee study in 2020 and projected inflation over the next three years, the Copyright Office said.
The independent music coalition argued that the proposed increase will land the hardest on independent creators who are least able to absorb it.
The coalition noted that independent artists and labels have almost no control over what they earn. Streaming royalty rates are set through deals negotiated by major labels with platforms like Spotify, and those rates then become the de facto market rate for independents. Mechanical royalties are set by the Copyright Royalty Board, while performance royalties flow through collective licensing bodies.
In almost every major revenue stream, independent creators have limited pricing ability and largely operate as “price-takers,” A2IM said.
“A 43% fee hike, imposed on independent artists and labels who are already navigating compressed streaming royalties, stagnant per-stream rates, and no ability to pass through costs, is not cost recovery; it is a barrier to justice.”
Ian Harrison, a2im
Citing data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, A2IM added that median hourly wage for musicians and singers rose about 35% in nominal terms to $42.45 in May 2024 from $31.40 in May 2020. But once the 23% inflation — the Copyright Office itself cites as the main justification for the fee hike proposal — is taken into account, real wage growth for the occupation was only about 10% during the same period, the filing said.
The Copyright Office is proposing to raise fees by 43% on registrants when their actual inflation-adjusted wages are less than a quarter of that, A2IM said.
The Labor figures exclude self-employed workers, meaning the data does not capture the majority of independent recording artists, session musicians, touring artists and songwriters who work on royalties and gig contracts.
For those artists, per-stream payments from major DSPs like Spotify have ranged between about $0.003 and $0.005 per stream over the same period, the filing said.
Ian Harrison, CEO of A2IM, said: “The Copyright Office’s mission is to serve every American creator, not just those with the most resources. A 43% fee hike, imposed on independent artists and labels who are already navigating compressed streaming royalties, stagnant per-stream rates, and no ability to pass through costs, is not cost recovery; it is a barrier to justice.
“Registration is the gateway to enforcement, and if we price independent creators out of that gateway, we are dismantling the very infrastructure that makes copyright meaningful for the people who need it most.”
Ian Harrison, a2im
“Registration is the gateway to enforcement, and if we price independent creators out of that gateway, we are dismantling the very infrastructure that makes copyright meaningful for the people who need it most. A2IM urges the Copyright Office to reconsider this proposal and to stand with the full, diverse community of American rightsholders it was created to serve.”
The filing also noted that under US copyright law, creators cannot sue for statutory damages or attorney’s fees unless their work was registered before the infringement occurred.
A2IM said: “Congress made registration the predicate for statutory damages, attorney’s fees, and Copyright Claims Board jurisdiction precisely because it wanted to encourage creators to register.”
With the fee increase, independent creators lose access to the Copyright Claims Board, which Congress created specifically so that independent artists could pursue infringement cases without the expense of federal court.
A2IM wrote: “For artists, labels, and songwriters whose works are infringed on a daily basis across the internet, the CCB represents a concrete, accessible remedy. But CCB jurisdiction requires a registered work.
“The registration fee increase therefore raises the price of access to the very system Congress designed to be affordable and does so at a moment when the CCB is still working to build awareness and usage among the independent creator community.”
Lisa Hresko, COO of A2IM, added: “Independent artists and the labels and managers who support them have always had to do more with less. What they cannot do is absorb a 43% fee increase on top of shrinking royalty rates and no leverage to demand more. The Copyright Office should be expanding access to the registration system, not making it more expensive.”
“Independent artists and the labels and managers who support them have always had to do more with less. What they cannot do is absorb a 43% fee increase on top of shrinking royalty rates and no leverage to demand more.”
Lisa Hresko, a2im
An A2IM member survey found that fewer than a third of respondents had registered more than 75% of their catalog, and cost was the most frequently cited barrier. Nine out of ten said they would register more work if an affordable bulk option were available.
Meanwhile, multiple labels reported limiting registration to their highest-value works or stopping registration for certain categories.
A2IM noted that independent music currently accounts for more than 35% of the US market share. “This reflects exactly the democratization of creative production and distribution that the copyright system is designed to foster.”
The coalition also flagged a concern surrounding the Congress’s bipartisan AI transparency mechanisms, including a bill called the CLEAR Act, that would give creators the ability to find out if their work was used to train AI models and seek remedies if it was.
A2IM wrote: “We are concerned that, if that bill were enacted, every independent creator priced out of registration by a fee increase would be a creator who cannot meaningfully participate in the enforcement framework Congress is building in an era of extreme uncertainty given Generative AI.”
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