The emergency wage subsidy is vital right now. At this point, without the subsidy, the teams would be decimated and the expertise needed to organize festivals and events would have vanished. For now, the emergency wage subsidy is vital and necessary for the recovery.
When I talk about 2022, despite what I told you earlier and our complete willingness to operate this summer to the best of our ability and in accordance with the public health rules, we know that won't be able to generate the independent revenue that we're used to generating. We'll probably dig our grave a little deeper this summer by increasing our deficits.
In terms of our business models, which are essentially based on large gatherings, the real return to normalcy won't take place until early next year, when we can start selling tickets again. For example, the Quebec City summer festival will start selling passes again, as it normally does, in February or March 2022 for its July 2022 edition. The festival will really be a little more comfortable financially at that time, when the ticket revenue starts coming in. The same is true for the free festivals, which will also get their sponsors back at that point.
So we need to cross the desert. Right now, the festival and event sector isn't dying, but we're about halfway there. We don't think that we'll be out of the woods until early next year.