Background

Dataset

Arts and Cultural Production Satellite Account (ACPSA)

Periodicity

The ACPSA is updated annually.

Source/Sponsor

Partnership between the National Endowment for the Arts’ Office of Research & Analysis and the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis

Research Topic

The arts economy

Notable Features

Inflation-adjusted estimates of arts and culture’s contributions to U.S. GDP

Full time-series spans 1998-2023, with estimates including:

• Gross output
• Employment and compensation by arts and cultural industries
• Supply and consumption of arts and cultural goods and services, including imports and exports
• Gross output price indexes for arts and cultural commodities
• Economic multipliers for arts and cultural commodities and employment

Updates

This release shows new estimates for 2023, in addition to providing revised data for 1998-2022. Statistics reported this year supersede all prior ACPSA statistics. The 2017 Benchmark Input-Output Table, produced by BEA in 2023, is the new inter-industry framework for ACPSA statistics. Prior ACPSA data sets used the 2012 inter-industry framework and, therefore, are not directly comparable.

Overview

Covering the full year of 2023, the arts and cultural sector reached an all-time high of $1.2 trillion in value added to the U.S. economy. That year, the arts represented 4.2 percent of the nation’s GDP. Between 2022 and 2023, the arts’ economic value surged by 6.6 percent, more than twice the rate of the total economy. Although most arts industries (27 out of 35) have overcome the effects of the 2020 (pandemic-era) recession, others continue to show less economic value than in 2019. 

Meanwhile, wage-and-salary employment in the arts and cultural sector has increased—to 5.4 million workers in 2023. Creative computer systems design and theatrical ticket agencies saw some of the most rapid growth in employment. While arts industry employment rates have fluctuated over the past three years, in 2023, more industries (22 out of 35) saw post-2019 gains in net employment than in 2022 or 2021.