Arts-culture-publishing contribute more to economy in U.S. than travel-tourism
By Dan Gorenstein, Marketplace
For the first time the federal government has tallied up the arts and culture contribution to the nation’s economy. It turns out that sector, movies, painting, publishing, cable and more, was worth half a trillion dollars — 3 percent to the gross domestic product in 2011. That’s more than the travel and tourism industry.
“Here you have for the first time, comprehensive empirical evidence from the point of view of economists that the arts play a substantial role in the nation’s economy,” says Sunil Iyengar who runs the Office of Research and Analysis for the National Endowment for the Arts.
In an instant, writers, app designers, publishers and painters just got a bunch of “street cred.” Nearly 2 million people work in the arts and culture industry which exported about $40 billion in goods and services in 2011. Some economists say ideas, innovation, and creativity are essential to growing the United States economy.