In late October, the National Endowment for the Arts released Artists and Arts Workers in the United States, a research note that analyzes artists and industries, state and metro employment rates, and new demographic information about artists such as age, education levels, income, ethnicity, and other social characteristics. Among the findings: there are 2.1 million artists in the U.S. workforce, making up 1.4 percent of the total workforce and 6.9 percent of the professional workforce. One in five (18 percent of) artists work in the “performing arts, spectator sports, and independent artists” category, including more than half (53 percent) of all musicians. In Tennessee, 22 percent of all working artists are musicians; New York and California have the highest numbers of artists in the U.S. Women artists earn $0.81 cents for every dollar earned by men artists, a gap similar to that in the overall labor force (where women earn $0.80 cents for every dollar earned by men). Artists are less socioeconomically and demographically diverse than the total U.S. workforce, yet diversity levels vary across individual artist occupations. For more information and to read the complete research note, visit the NEA website.
Posted November 2, 2011
