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Feel it’s important to point out, while everyone fiddles with the government career generator or whatever it is, that I already *have* another job, in addition to being a writer, and so do most of the writers I know.
The government’s total lack of interest in supporting art and artists isn’t new. I find it as short sighted and unhealthy as ever, but as always when this debate pops up, we have to be careful we’re not disparaging the jobs of others and unnecessarily avoiding nuance.
The reality is that I know several writers who are *already* funding training in another career themselves. This is partly necessity, but it’s also partly the natural result of having other interests and skills.
The truth is, if the government were prepared to actually be bold and pay artists to train or at the very least help out with costs so that those artists could pursue other careers they were likely already interested in anyway, I think there would actually be interest.
This would be particularly true if those careers were in areas of much needed social contribution.
Imagine a system that said, look, we have a shortage in certain areas of health and social care, support, advice giving etc, which you can train into in a reasonable space of time. You need flexible work, an alternative source of income and maybe a sense of social connection.
Many of us who have a career alongside writing are actually loathe to let that career go. We don’t just do it because we have to. If the government had some insight into that and thought about ways of helping out with it I think a lot of people would pay attention.
Imagine a programme that helped interested writers and artists get eg a therapy or counselling qualification. That’s just one area where two careers can be of mutual and interesting benefit to each other. There would definitely be interest.
So in dismissing the government’s non-plan we have to be careful we’re not dismissing the *very concept* of an additional career because it can be valuable, stabilising, and rewarding.
Also, removing the need for ones art to pay *all the bills* can be creatively incredibly freeing too.
Sometimes just feel like writers talk about non-writing work (a) as if they’re not doing it already and (b) as if all non writing work is some kind of hideous drudgery and I feel like that’s not a great position either way.
Might go some way to accounting for British fiction’s long standing reluctance to properly address work and labour 
This is the reality for so many people trying to achieve a balance though: you’ll feel alienated from a world of work that doesn’t value art *and* from a world of art that disrespects work it regards as non-creative.
