For the UK economy, the creative industries are huge
You might be surprised how much the UK depends on its continuously thriving (and yet underpaid) creative sector
John Kampfner, CE of the new Creative Industries Federation, shared some statistics in Creative Review that may (or may not) surprise you. Read the full article here – though it requires a free sign-up to access.
We’d be the last people to measure the value of something by its contribution to the economy, but it’s a thought-provoking read if you (like us) wonder about the future of post-industrial, semi-automated, pre-mid-??-Brexit Britain.
Whenever I recite the following stats in speeches across the country, audiences gasp. The creative industries contribute £92 bn net to the UK economy and directly employ two million people. A further million work in creative jobs in other sectors, for example designers in manufacturing. That’s one in every eleven jobs. Last year alone, employment in this sector grew at four times the rate of the general economy.
This is the one I like the most: the creative industries are now worth more to the UK than oil and gas, life sciences, aviation and the car industry combined. There’s nothing soft or superfluous about this sector, it’s not a ‘nice to have’. This, alongside technology, is where 21st- century growth should come from.
