Art + The Economy: Facts for your Back Pocket
Snapshots of art in action where I live, Ames, Iowa.
A few years ago, I co-presented to our local city council about why art matters to our community, and specifically why art matters to our economic development. (It’s often really surprising to discover just how much arts and culture contribute to our national economies.) I was nervous. It was a push to ask the city to put a lot more resources into our art and culture sector.
In the years following, more and more data has come out to support just how much the arts support our local, regional, and national economies. Following is a list of some handy facts to use when people make, shall we say, uninformed comments about art and the economy, plus the cited sources of said facts.
***Disclaimer: The economic contribution is only a sliver of why art matters to our local and national communities. There are beaucoup reasons why art matters, such as increasing well-being and mental health, increasing sense of belonging in our communities and contributing to a strong sense of place.
Think creative, not artist
First of all, I encourage you to think beyond the term “artist” and instead think of people who create for a living. Creatives include everyone from architects to choir directors to graphic designers to radio announcers to photographers to writers. These folks make up our creative classes. Creatives (including whom we would conventionally call artists) are also small business owners and entrepreneurs.
And as creative entrepreneurs in the age of digital technology, many of us have the option of being location independent. We can move to places simply to have an increased quality of life. Many communities are capitalizing on this by creating artist relocation programs to lure artists into moving to their towns.
Places with artist relocation programs recognize that artists are small business owners, often with national or international clientele that don’t compete with the existing businesses where they choose to live.
Jennifer Drinkwater, Sculpture Workshop, acrylic on wood, 12” x 12”, 2023.
Oskaloosa, Iowa, is so lucky to have such a rich, supportive arts community. The Sculpture Workshop acts as a kind of satellite studio for the Oskaloosa Art Center, and was donated by a local resident so that artist Matt Kargol could teach folks how to create sculpture. Matt and Sarah Kargol, both amazing artists and directors of the Oskaloosa Art Center (among other things), created the Oskaloosa Sculpture Tour, now in its ninth year.
6 FACTS for the art Skeptics in Your Life.
In their 2023 Arts and Economic Prosperity Report, advocacy and research organization Americans for the Arts reported that in 2022, United States’ “nonprofit arts and culture organizations and their audiences generated $151.7 billion in economic activity—$73.3 billion in spending by the organizations, which leveraged an additional $78.4 billion in event-related spending by their audiences. The impact of this economic activity is far reaching, supporting 2.6 million jobs, generating $29.1 billion in tax revenue, and providing $101 billion in personal income to residents.”
You should absolutely read between the lines here to suss out that the above data only represents NONPROFIT arts and cultural organizations, and does NOT include for-profit creatives/artists/etc. When you include total arts/culture impact per year in the United States, the total economic activity is $876,665 BILLION (basically a ba-jillion), which is 4.2% of the annual GDP, and incidentally, is more than transportation and warehousing.
In 2023, the National Endowment for the Arts reported for each dollar awarded by the NEA in direct grants to arts nonprofits, these groups leverage up to nine dollars in private and other public funds. In other words, artists create nine dollars from every one dollar they receive from the National Endowment for the Arts. That’s a solid return on investment, particularly since the $207 million budget for National Endowment for the Arts accounts for a measly 0.012% of annual federal spending.
Creative events - such as concerts, festivals, plays - are big business for local economies, and drive economic impact even beyond ticket sales. The Americans for the Arts calculated that the average audience member spends about $39 per event, not counting buying their ticket or food/drink at the event. Folks go out to dinner after the show, they get a babysitter, they have drinks, they maybe get a fancy new outfit. All of this benefits local businesses.
Surprisingly, Hawaii and Minnesota lead the United States in art and culture spending at $11.73 and $10.22 per person, per year, respectively. And currently, Minnesota’s art and culture sector stands at $12.6 billion per year. In comparison to where I live, Iowa (#37 on the list of state arts funding) spends about 39 cents per capita per year and our art and culture sector is $4.2 billion per year. And Mississippi loves its artists! It’s #14 with $3.76 per capita per year supporting the arts. This makes this Mississippi expat very happy :)
Minnesota accomplished this amazing arts ecosystem by passing the Legacy Amendment in 2009, which increased the state sales tax by 3/8 of one percent. Nearly 20 percent of that 3/8 of a percent goes into an arts and cultural heritage fund, which has translated into $565.3 million for Minnesota arts and culture producers and organizations over the last decade. Personally, I view taxes as a way to invest in my community, so increasing the sales tax by a mere 3/8 of one percent seems like a steal to me, particularly if it leads to such a massive increase in quality of life.
***Creative Minnesota is a nonprofit advocacy group that actively tracks the economic impacts of the Legacy Amendment on the art and culture sector in each region and county of the state. If you heart data, it is a fun rabbit hole to go down.
Jennifer Drinkwater, Mammoth Puppet Parade, acrylic on wood, 12” x 12”, 2023.
In September 2022, I witnessed one of the coolest community art events I’ve ever seen: Oskaloosa’s lighted puppet parade, courtesy of William Penn University Theatre Director Brant Bollman; puppeteer and founder of Thingumajig Theatre, Andrew Kim; loads of William Penn students and faculty; the good folks from George Daily Community and FACE (Fine Art and Cultural Events) Mahaska County; and Oskaloosa High School art students.
Students worked for two weeks with Andrew and Brant making puppets, then staged a community-wide puppet parade on the town's recreation trail, complete with a drum line. It was something else, and several hundred people showed up.
Let’s do the math: $39/person x 200 people = $7800 for Oskaloosa businesses because a bunch of really creative people threw a parade. For example, I drove all the way from Ames to Oskaloosa to attend, had dinner, went to the bookstore, and then got gas before heading to the parade.
How to Find What Your City Spends Per Year on Art and Culture:
If you visit your local city’s homepage, you should be able to locate recent city budgets under the Finance Department tab (for really small communities, look under Finance Officer).
Depending on the size of the community, local expenditures will include things like “culture and recreation,” “arts agencies,” or “public art fund”.
Some towns may have a local orchestra or city band, a theatre, or a community center, which would be listed. From there, you can see what is spent and where those monies come from, like the general fund or a local option tax or a hotel/motel tax.
It can take a little bit of digging, and you can always pick up the phone and call somebody at City Hall if its gets hairy.
If you are considering relocating, you can tell a lot about what a state or a community values (IMO) by where they spend their dollars.
Jennifer Drinkwater, I Could Live in This Room, limited edition print, 18”.x 12”, 2021.
Bookstores count! This painting was inspired by the story of Dixie Scovel, a Long Island woman who decided to move from NY to Mississippi because of the writing culture and places like Square Books, one of the nation’s best bookstores located in Oxford, Mississippi.