The verdict is in: A national arts group has facts and figures demonstrating a direct connection between arts and the creative sector and Massachusetts’ economic growth.
The nonprofit arts industry supported 73,288 jobs in Massachusetts in 2015, generating $2.2 billion in economic activity, according to Americans for the Arts President Bob Lynch, quoted in a State House News Service story.
These findings are not news to municipal leaders in Lynn, Medford, and other communities where arts organizations have helped anchor Lynn’s downtown revival and a month-long Arts Across Medford celebration which got underway last weekend.
City leaders in both communities support local arts organizations like Arts After Hours and Arts Across Medford and have succeeded in attracting out-of-town creative talent including the international artists who made Lynn’s Beyond Walls downtown mural blitz a success.
The persistent push to link arts to local economies, including ones creating jobs in Peabody and Revere and Malden, stands in contrast to battles on the state level to preserve arts funding.
Earlier this month the Massachusetts House overrode $275 million of the $320 million that Gov. Charlie Baker vetoed from the $39.4 billion fiscal 2018 budget. State tax revenues have fallen short of expectations in recent years, leading to midyear budget cuts and constraints on the state’s spending agenda.
The News Service reported Baker vetoed $1.8 million in funding for the Massachusetts Cultural Council. The House overrode the veto and the spending would be restored if the Senate does the same.
The attention focused on the arts in Lynn and Medford is proof that cities and towns have met the state more than halfway when it comes to supporting the arts and recognizing their value as an economic generator.
Arts have the potential to showcase a community, to paint it — no pun intended — in the best possible light and provide business owners, developers and people thinking about moving into a community a good look at a community’s positive side.
Arts also have a close tie to local schools and youth-oriented programs. Those connections have the potential to make communities safer by putting kids on a creative instead of a crime-oriented life track.
In addition to reporting on Americans for the Arts data, the News Service also reported that studies found 310,000 people employed in the “creative economy” in the region. Attendance at cultural events in Massachusetts totaled 29.7 million in fiscal 2015, according to the Americans for the Arts study.
Everyone knows the joke about graduating college with an arts degree. But the arts are an engine spinning out economic growth and good news in Lynn and other communities.
