Editor’s note: This is part of NBC News’ Checkbook Chronicles, a series of profiles highlighting the financial realities of everyday Americans.

Doug Sharp isn’t a rich man — but he has played one in Hollywood.

Sharp, 59, lives in Los Angeles and until recently got the bulk of his income by driving for Uber and Lyft while moonlighting as a paid extra.

It’s the chance to earn the spotlight and work with others who share his passion for acting that keeps him going after years of having failed to find any other kind of full-time work.

Primary source of income: Sharp says he struggles to make ends meet, having survived the past few years on a generous pandemic unemployment reimbursement.

He has begun taking delivery orders on UberEats, but he said the pay barely makes it worth it.

What keeps Sharp going is acting — a notoriously fickle endeavor but one he says has upside potential. He recently got a small speaking part in a coming production featuring at least two Hollywood A-listers — and saw his daily pay rate go from about $200 to nearly $1,200.

‘The money for background is good, and there’s always the possibility of being upgraded to principal,’ he said. ‘That has happened to me — I have not found a replacement for it.’

Still, it’s not consistent enough for him to obtain full Screen Actors Guild benefits, so his health insurance is through Medicaid.

Living situation: Sharp lives alone and said his housing situation is unstable. It includes periodically renting from a friend, as well as an unauthorized arrangement he wasn’t comfortable discussing on the record.

Economic outlook: After nearly a decade of making steady pay driving for Uber and Lyft, Sharp has effectively quit both platforms for now, in part, he said, because their base pay and regular rates are no longer enough make it worth it to use them, especially for what’s needed to live in Los Angeles.

Acting remains enjoyable — Sharp said he isn’t a celebrity hound and simply enjoys being around other people.

‘The older you get, the less parts there are,’ he said. ‘However, the pool of older guys is smaller — and shockingly I always play the rich white guy, because that’s what I look like. But I didn’t I know look like a rich white guy until I started playing one.’

Yet the gigs have hardly been steady enough to make a career out of.

‘What I can tell you is I barely work,’ Sharp said. ‘In May I worked two days, in April I worked four days, in March I worked two days, in February I worked two days, in January I worked one day.’

Budget pain points: Sharp struggles buying basic necessities, to the point that he found himself recently trying to return goods around his residence to Home Depot and Walmart for cash or credit.

He owns a car, a Fiat 500, but is trying to obtain a new one through a rental company so he can get back to driving for Uber and Lyft — even at the reduced rates. However, he’s not sure his credit score will be good enough for him to obtain the new vehicle.

Outlook: Sharp said he basically started his life over in his 40s, when he got a business degree from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. But he graduated in 2013, when the economy was still emerging from the global financial crisis, and he couldn’t land a job.

Uber, and later Lyft, provided a lifeline, and he enjoyed the work. But over the years, their rates got lower and lower.

Still, returning to those platforms remains his key financial objective.

In the meantime, Sharp struggles with depression and anxiety.

‘The one thing people hate are educated white men who look rich but who are poor,’ Sharp said. ‘They think, ‘Oh, he must be lazy or on drugs. What is his problem?’ I get this — I’ve watched my friend group move away.’

‘I am ashamed about where I am in my life as it relates to my finances and not knowing how to fix it,” he continued.

Finding a full-time job — even at a fast-food restaurant, and even in a labor market that the Federal Reserve says remains relatively healthy — has been a lot more difficult than one might imagine.

‘I do qualify for food stamps; I do qualify for [Medicaid],’ he said. ‘I’m not embarrassed about that, but when I’m willing to work — and bust my ass — why is it that I can’t get a living wage?’

Ironically, fast-food jobs are now quite difficult to obtain, Sharp said, not least because their hourly wages are higher than in many other industries thanks to California’s new $20 minimum wage for workers in the sector.

‘It’s embarrassing, because it seems like there’s a piece of the puzzle that I’m not telling,’ Sharp said. ‘I’m doing everything I can.’

The U.S. Federal Reserve may start cutting interest rates before year’s end. That could make future trips abroad more expensive for the nation’s travelers.

That’s due to how interest-rate policy affects the strength of the U.S. dollar.

Here’s the basic idea: An environment of rising U.S. interest rates relative to those in other nations is generally “dollar positive,” said Jonathan Petersen, senior markets economist and foreign exchange specialist at Capital Economics.

In other words, rising rates underpin a stronger U.S. dollar versus foreign currencies. Americans can buy more stuff with their money overseas.

The opposite dynamic — falling interest rates — tends to be “dollar negative,” Petersen said. A weaker dollar means Americans can buy less abroad.

Fed officials in June signaled they expect to cut rates once in 2024 and four additional times in 2025.

“Our expectation for now is the dollar will come under more pressure next year,” Petersen said.

However, that’s not necessarily a foregone conclusion. Some financial experts think the dollar’s strength may have staying power.

“There have been quite a few headlines calling for the U.S. dollar’s demise,” Richard Madigan, chief investment officer at J.P. Morgan Private Bank, wrote in a recent note. “I continue to believe the dollar remains the one-eyed man in the land of the blind.”

The Fed started raising interest rates aggressively in March 2022 to tame high pandemic-era inflation. By July 2023, the central bank had raised rates to their highest level in 23 years.

The dollar’s strength surged against that backdrop.

The Nominal Broad U.S. Dollar Index is higher than at any pre-pandemic point dating to at least 2006, when the central bank started tracking such data. The index gauges the dollar’s appreciation relative to currencies of the nation’s main trading partners such as the euro, the Canadian dollar and the Japanese yen.

For example, in July 2022, the U.S. dollar reached parity with the euro for the first time in 20 years, meaning they had a 1:1 exchange rate. (The euro has since rebounded a bit.)

In early July, the U.S. dollar hit its strongest level against the yen in 38 years.

A strong U.S. dollar gives “a discount on everything you’re purchasing while you’re abroad,” Petersen said.

“In a sense, it’s never been cheaper to go to Japan,” he added.

A record number of Americans visited Japan in April, according to the Asian nation’s tourism board. Benjamin Atwater, a communications specialist at InsideAsia Tours, a travel agency, attributes that partly to the financial incentive bestowed by a strong dollar.

In fact, he personally recently extended a work trip to Japan by a week and a half — instead of opting to travel elsewhere in Asia — largely because of the favorable exchange rate.

Everything from meals, hotels, souvenirs and the rental car were a “great value,” said Atwater, who lives in Denver and has long wanted to travel to Japan.

“It was always portrayed as one of the most expensive places you can go, [but] I was getting some of best steaks I’ve ever had for like $12,” he said.

In reality, the dynamics driving dollar fluctuations are more complex than whether the Fed raises or lowers interest rates.

The differential in U.S. rates versus other nations is what’s significant, economists said. Fed policy doesn’t exist in a vacuum: Other central banks are also simultaneously making interest-rate choices.

The European Central Bank cut interest rates in June, for example. Meanwhile, the Fed has kept rates higher for longer than many forecasters anticipated — meaning the rate differential between the U.S. and Europe has widened, helping support the dollar.

“The Fed’s on hold, other central banks are getting ready to ease and the Bank of Japan (BoJ) seems stuck in a moment,” J.P. Morgan’s Madigan wrote.

“If Japan wants the yen to stabilize, policy rates need to move higher,” he added. “That doesn’t appear to be happening anytime soon. With the ECB expected to cut ahead of the Fed, I expect current euro weakness to also prevail.”

This is happening against the backdrop of a relatively strong U.S. economy, which also generally supports a strong dollar, Petersen said. At a high level, a strong economy means there will generally be higher economic growth and/or inflation, which means a greater likelihood the Fed will keep interest rates relatively high, he said.

A strong economy also typically incentivizes foreigners to park more money in the U.S., he said.

For example, investors generally get a better return on cash when interest rates are high. If an investor in Europe or Asia were getting perhaps 1% or 2% on bank account holdings while such holdings in the U.S. were yielding 5%, that investor might shift some money to the U.S., Petersen said.

Or, an investor might want more to hold more of their portfolio in U.S. rather than European stocks if the economic growth outlook wasn’t good in Europe, he said.

In such cases, foreigners buy dollar-denominated financial assets. They’d sell their local currency and buy the dollar, a process that ultimately bids up the dollar’s strength, Petersen said.

Exchange rates “all come down to capital flows,” he said.

While these dynamics also hold true in emerging markets, currency fluctuations can be more volatile than in developed nations due to factors like political shocks and risks to commodity prices like those of oil, he added.

For more than 10,000 Olympic athletes, making it to Paris this summer is a dream come true. Thousands of potential tourists feel otherwise.

Delta Air Lines says travelers are avoiding the city this summer and booking to destinations elsewhere, amounting to a $100 million hit for the airline during an otherwise bustling summer for European travel, CEO Ed Bastian said.

Delta’s third-quarter profit and revenue forecast fell short of Wall Street expectations after airlines flooded the market with added flights. The airline reiterated its full-year outlook Thursday.

“Unless you’re going to the Olympics, people aren’t going to Paris…very few are,” Bastian told CNBC. “Business travel, you know, other type of tourism is potentially going elsewhere.”

Delta has the most service of any U.S. airline to Paris and has a joint venture with Air France. Together the two carriers have approximately 70% market share in nonstop service between the U.S. and France, according to consulting firm ICF.

On July 1, Air France-KLM, the parent of Air France, forecast a revenue hit of as much as 180 million euros $195.5 million) in June through August because of the Olympic Games.

“International markets show a significant avoidance of Paris,” the company said. “Travel between the city and other destinations is also below the usual June-August average as residents in France seem to be postponing their holidays until after the Olympic Games or considering alternative travel plans.”

Bastian said Paris demand after the Olympics, which run July 26 through August 11, will likely be strong. “During the period itself there’s a little bit of a hesitation,” he said. Air France-KLM had a similar projection.

One clear deterrent for mid-summer travel to Paris: Prices for hotel rooms are set to skyrocket.

Hotel-data firm STR said revenue per available room for upscale hotels in Paris will soar as much as 45% in July and August from last year. Meanwhile, it forecast a 3% to 5% increase in the metric in London and 2% to 4% increase in Rome for the same months over 2023.

Many travelers were already shifting their European vacations beyond the traditional summer travel season, Delta’s president, Glen Hauenstein, said on an earnings call on Thursday. That gives airlines a chance to earn more revenue outside of traditional peak seasons.

“We see the season extending as a whole group of people, whether or not it’s retirees, whether or not it’s people with double incomes and without children, who don’t have the school concerns,” he said. “It’s actually a better time to go to Europe in September and October than it is potentially in July and August when the weather is so hot and everything is so packed.”

He also said Delta is seeing a boom in travel to Japan, thanks in large part to a favorable exchange rate for U.S. tourists.

“When the yen was 83 [per U.S. dollar], it was very difficult to be able to afford to go see Japan and all the great things that Japan has to offer. With the yen at 160, it’s a very different world for U.S. travelers and they seem to be taking great advantage of that,” he said.

Disclosure: CNBC parent NBCUniversal owns NBC Sports and NBC Olympics. NBC Olympics is the U.S. broadcast rights holder to all Summer and Winter Games through 2032.

DVD rental service Redbox is set to shut down after 22 years in business, as streaming continues to dominate the at-home entertainment market.

Redbox’s parent company, Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment, changed its Chapter 11 bankruptcy case, filed last month, to a Chapter 7 liquidation case on Wednesday. The conversion signifies that the company couldn’t come up with a repayment plan for its outstanding debts and will soon turn to selling off assets to pay back creditors.

With the change to a Chapter 7 case, all employees will now be laid off and Redbox’s 24,000 kiosks will close. Lawyers for Chicken Soup for the Soul told the court they had worked “day and night” to find a solution to avoid the outcome, Deadline reported.

A current Redbox employee, who asked not to be identified due to uncertainty over future legal actions he said some at the company are considering, said the news has been destabilizing.

“Sentiment’s in the gutter,” he said. “We have coworkers who’ve missed rent, facing eviction.”

The employee said staffers were told during a town hall meeting Thursday that they wouldn’t be receiving pay for the hours they’ve worked so far this month. Additionally, he said layoffs wouldn’t be made official until a bankruptcy trustee is appointed, raising concerns about when employees can file for unemployment insurance.

A Delaware judge overseeing the case indicated Wednesday that “there is no means to continue to pay employees,” the Hollywood Reporter reported Thursday.

A lawyer for Redbox and a representative for the company didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.

Founded in 2002, Redbox at its peak shook up Hollywood with its rental service, which at the time was cheaper than buying a DVD. But with the rise of digital offerings and streaming platforms, DVD sales collapsed during the 2010s.

In 2022, Redbox had $325 million in debt, and Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment acquired it.

The parent company had accumulated $1 billion in debt by the time of its bankruptcy filing last month. According to court documents filed earlier this month, it was struggling to make payroll and pay for health care plans for its more than 1,000 employees.

Redbox is just the latest physical media company that has struggled to survive streaming’s dominance. Some 99% of U.S. households pay for at least one service, a Forbes survey found this year; others rely on free ad-supported streaming platforms. This year, Best Buy stopped selling physical media like DVDs and Blu-rays, attributing it to the shift in consumption of entertainment.

Streaming, meanwhile, reached a record-high share of TV viewership in May, a recent Nielsen report found.