SB ART & CULTURE
BY SEVA MAY
HOW THE ARTS IMPACT
THE ECONOMY
T
Photo courtesy of the Shreveport Opera
ake a moment and imagine what our lives would be like without live theatre or art galleries. Where sitting in a theatre and watching a symphony, an opera performance or a ballet was no longer available. What would it be like if we couldn’t watch a feature film in a movie theatre or if taking a trip to the library or museum wasn’t possible? Would you be upset if you couldn’t go to a club to dance to your favorite band or laugh along with your friends at a comedy show? Oh, wait! That just happened. For over a year we’ve been shut off from the arts and the events that are crucial in shaping our culture. Sure, hundreds of virtual events have been made available. But it’s just not the same energy you experience with a “live” event. Fortunately, we are just getting all these things we’ve taken for granted all our lives back on track. Our world is getting somewhat back to normal. Since we now know what it feels like, let’s look at what the economic impact has been to the incredible loss of the arts even for this relatively short period of time. I turned to The
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Arts and Cultural Production Satellite Account (ACPSA) for the following data. The ACPSA measures the total economic output for arts and cultural industries and goods and services, as well as total employment and compensation numbers for workers in those industries. By studying consumer spending on arts and culture and import/ export activity we can better understand the importance of art and culture. The data are presented as a time series (going back more than two decades), making it possible for researchers, policy makers, and industry groups to monitor short- and long-term trends in arts and cultural production. These statistics are from 2019 and since we do not have 2020 stats, yet we can get a general idea of the economic impact cultural organizations have on our lives. Arts and cultural economic activity, adjusted for inflation, increased 3.7 percent in 2019 after increasing 2.3 percent in 2018. Arts and cultural economic activity accounted for 4.3 percent, or $919.7 billion, of current-dollar gross domestic product (GDP), in 2019. Core arts and cultural production industries, which include performing arts, museums, design services, fine
