Stephanie L. López (The News Journal/The Weekly Journal) reports on a study on artistic and economic prosperity—Arts and Economic Prosperity 6 (AEP6)—directed by the organization Americans for the Arts that included Puerto Rico. The entity in charge of collecting data on the island was the Institute of Puerto Rican Culture [Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña (ICP)]. One of the findings is that the average expense related to artistic events in Puerto Rico is higher than the average in the United States. It is also interesting that the study attributed an estimated added dollar value to hours of volunteer work. [Many thanks to David Lewis for bringing this item to our attention.]

For the first time, Puerto Rico was part of the study on Artistic and Economic Prosperity directed by the organization Americans for the Arts, whose results demonstrated a positive impact on job creation, expenses related to the events and government collections as a result of the fiscal year 2022 cultural activities.

“We always go by used data from the United States and specifically those that have been published by Americans for the Arts, which is the most comprehensive study on what the economic impact of arts and culture events would be. We know that Puerto Rico, due to our condition as an archipelago and the importance of cultural and artistic issues here, in addition to the level of quality of the type of productions we make, we understood that there were some differences, but we had not been able to account for them. So, already having this data is wonderful, above all, not only for the use of the institution, but also content for general knowledge,” Jessabet Vivas, programmatic advisor of the Institute of Puerto Rican Culture (ICP, in Spanish), told The News Journal.

Arts and Economic Prosperity 6 (AEP6) is a national study that documents the economic and social impacts of the country’s nonprofit cultural and arts industry, and the ICP was the entity in charge of collecting the information through forms during the last months.

The average expense related to an artistic event in Puerto Rico was higher than the average in the United States. On the island, the typical attendee of a non-profit artistic or cultural event spent an average of $63.94, while in the U.S. level, it was $38.46 (not including the cost of admission, or food and drinks purchased on site during the event). In the case of non-resident attendees of that city (5.2%), they spent an average of $76.03 on the island and the U.S. was $60.57 per person.

Additionally, 61.9% of non-local attendees reported that the primary purpose of their visit was specifically to attend the performance, event, exhibition, site or installation where they were surveyed.

The largest spending category was food and drink purchased outside local establishments, which accounted for 38.5%, while retail purchases were the second largest category (16.7%), followed by local accommodation (13.0%), transportation (10.6%), clothing and accessories (7.9%), groceries and supplies (7.8%), childcare (1.6%) and others (3.8%).

Nationally, total event-related spending was estimated at $78.4 billion. This spending supported 2.6 million jobs, provided $101 billion in household income, and generated $29.1 million in total government revenue.

“The economic contribution or direct income generation of the non-profit art and culture sector for 2022 in Puerto Rico was $180 million. Of this amount, $51.7 million were in expenditures by arts and cultural organizations, and an additional $128.4 million in event-related expenditures by their audiences,” Vivas said. That economic activity supported 3,074 jobs, provided $98 million in personal income to residents, and generated $32.1 million in tax revenue for local, state and federal governments.

“That is a very important issue, because this study only goes to the non-profit sector, it does not include all the for-profit art and culture offer, which is a lot. Many times, we think that if they are non-profit, there is automatically no type of economic impact through tax revenue. But, this is not true,” said Vivas.

On the other hand, it was highlighted that during the year there were a total of 2,845 volunteers who donated a total of 136,339 hours to the 91 participating organizations in Puerto Rico. This represents a donation of time with an estimated added dollar value of $2 million. The 91 participating organizations in Puerto Rico reported an average of 31.3 volunteers who contributed an average of 47.9 hours each, for a total of 1,498 hours per organization during 2022.

Social impact

For his part, Randy Cohen, vice president of Research and Policy at Americans for the Arts, highlighted that unlike other previous editions, this year they took the task of asking about social impact, asking questions about how important these artistic and cultural organizations are.

“In Puerto Rico, 94.8% said that this artistic activity inspires a feeling of pride in the community. 92% said they felt a great sense of loss if this cultural event were no longer available. 94% say that it is essential so that future generations can have this artistic and cultural opportunity. I think that is the call to action, why this is such a relevant study for arts advocates and people looking to build healthier, stronger communities,” Cohen said.

Meanwhile, the executive director of the ICP, Carlos Ruiz Cortés, stressed that “this work validates the information that we can now use, and not only for us at the ICP but for all agencies and organizations. They are documents that validate your work. Both the university with its cultural management programs and also private corporations can use this to see what can happen when they invest in any type of programming related to art and culture.

For original article, see https://www.theweeklyjournal.com/top-stories/puerto-ricos-artistic-impact-on-job-creation-and-economic-prosperity/article_ec49a956-6e84-11ee-8195-bf723e6c398d.html