The City Council of San Antonio recently heard testimony about the economic impact of the arts in the Alamo City. To accurately gauge how the city’s art, artists and their output affect the city financially, officials enlisted Steven Nivin, an associate professor of economics at St. Mary's University, who first defined the term "creative economy."
“This definition goes back to the first creative economy plan that San Antonio did back in 2003,” Nivin said. “You can see it includes both nonprofit and for-profit organizations within the creative industry.”
The numbers he cited include both artists and workers in associated industries, but also artists who were self-employed, which he said gives a more accurate total.
“So the industry in 2023 employed 20,845 workers — pretty good growth since 2019, where there were 19,894 workers,” he said.
The COVID-19 pandemic affected some of the growth. “Throughout this data, you'll see there'll be a dip during the 2020 during the pandemic, and then the industry recovered quite nicely coming out of the pandemic,” Nivin said.
Nivin noted that the real financial impact of the city’s artistic inclinations run into the several billions of dollars. To illustrate, he noted the impact art had locally last year: “Total economic impact of the industry in 2023 measures at about $4.6 billion. The 20,845 workers earned about $1.2 billion in income in 2023 — a very sizable industry with a substantial impact within the local economy.”
Nivin noted that there are other benefits that are harder to measure and attribute specifically to art, but are valuable, nonetheless.
“I think you've seen that the creative industry does make a substantial contribution to the local economy, but this is, I think, a rather unique industry. It is unique because its impacts really extend beyond the standard economic impacts that we measure here.”
Nivin quoted from the book Your Brain on Arts, which he found particularly helpful to give context to facts and figures about the industry.
“Art creates culture. Culture creates community, and community creates humanity. The creative industry and arts really help spawn innovation, birth new thoughts and ideas,” Nivin said. “The arts empower us to reimagine, re-envision, and reconnect in order to create a better future together. The impacts really extend well beyond those numbers that we talked about here today.”
Krystal Jones, director the city's Department of Arts and Culture, also pointed to long-term health and intellectual benefits.
“There's other impacts for the arts when it comes to higher test scores, for students when they are exposed to the arts, they have higher test scores. It has health and wellness, mental health benefits,” she said.
Jones said that her department has measured art and artists for years, compiling data and the people behind it. She was optimistic about harnessing some of the art information infrastructure her department has been building to continue to grow the arts economy.
