Which Canadian provinces and territories saw the largest pandemic-induced decreases in their cultural economies?

Plus: Which provinces and territories had the largest cultural economies in 2020?

The key question that I investigate this week is: In which Canadian provinces and territories did the cultural economy decrease the most in 2020, the first year of the pandemic?

I’ll also compare per capita impacts on Gross Domestic Product (GDP) between the provinces and territories using the most recent data (2020). This will serve as a starter for next week’s post on longer-term changes in economic impacts in the provinces and territories (back to 2010, the first year of comparable data).

The main section in today’s post highlights three measures of pandemic-induced changes (all from 2019 to 2020, not adjusted for inflation or population growth):

• Gross Domestic Product (or direct economic impact, a measure of net value-added to the economy)

• Output (roughly equivalent to total revenues, including multiple counting of revenues that stay within the cultural economy)

• Jobs (including both full-time and part-time positions, not on a full-time-equivalent basis)

The data source is Statistics Canada’s Provincial and Territorial Culture Indicators, 2020. While the data are brand new (released on June 2), the most recent year in the data is 2020, the first year of the pandemic.

The measurement of the cultural economy is quite broad, including (in descending order of GDP impact in Canada): audiovisual and interactive media; visual and applied arts; government-owned cultural institutions (which are excluded from other areas); written and published works; live performance; heritage and libraries; sound recording; as well as education and training. See the notes at the end of this post for further explanations and definitions.

Readers of this post probably know that the culture sector has been very strongly affected by the pandemic. If you need a reminder, please have a look at three of my previous analyses: Organizational stress and resilience in the arts in Canada, Artists in the pandemic, and Arts and cultural workers in the pandemic.

Between 2019 and 2020, Canada’s cultural economy shrunk by 6% (as measured by GDP), with an 11% decrease in cultural jobs. Did this vary across the country? How?

Alberta’s cultural economy took the worst hit in 2020

The main table this week shows the changes between 2019 and 2020 in culture sector GDP, output (similar to total revenues), and jobs. The table is presented in ascending order of the one-year change in culture sector GDP, not adjusted for inflation or population growth.

The worst hit cultural economy is in Alberta – the only province or territory with a double-digit decrease in GDP (-10%) and output (also -10%) in 2020. Culture jobs in Alberta also decreased by a large amount (-13%), above the national average (-11%).

Three other provinces experienced above-average decreases in culture sector GDP in 2020: Quebec, Newfoundland and Labrador, and Alberta (all -7%).

Two large cultural economies (Ontario and British Columbia) saw their direct economic impact decrease by 5%, and they lost many cultural jobs (-9% in B.C. and -11% in Ontario).

On the jobs front, Yukon’s cultural economy experienced the largest decrease (-14%), followed by Alberta (-13%) and Newfoundland and Labrador (also -13%). Five other provinces saw double-digit decreases in cultural jobs (Quebec, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Prince Edward Island).

Only one jurisdiction saw an increase (albeit very small) in their culture sector economy between 2019 and 2020: Nunavut (+1%). Despite this, there was still a 6% decrease in cultural jobs in Nunavut in 2020.

Bonus: Which provinces and territories have the largest cultural economies?

The following graph presents the 2020 data on culture sector GDP and output per capita in each province and territory (plus the Canadian average). Two provinces and two territories had an above-average impact on GDP, on a per-resident basis:

• Ontario: $1,833

• Northwest Territories: $1,712

• Nunavut: $1,580

• British Columbia: $1,555

The nine other provinces and territories fall below the national average of $1,460 per person.

The data on output follow a similar pattern but are roughly twice as large as the data on net impact on GDP.

These figures depend, of course, on the structure of each province’s cultural economy and their resilience in the face of pandemic-induced challenges.

Notes and data source

Statistics Canada defines culture sector GDP as:

The economic value added associated with culture activities. This is the value added related to the production of culture goods and services across the economy, regardless of the producing industry. Culture jobs are the number of jobs that are related to the production of culture goods and services.

Six main areas (called “domains” by Statistics Canada) are included in the calculations:

• Live performance (including performing arts as well as cultural festivals and celebrations, excluding government-owned organizations, which are captured in “governance, funding, and professional support”.)

• Visual and applied arts (including architecture, advertising, crafts, design, and works of art)

• Written and published works (including books, newspapers, periodicals, and other published works)

• Audiovisual and interactive media (including broadcasting, film and video, and interactive media, excluding government-owned organizations, which are captured in “governance, funding, and professional support”)

• Sound recording (and music publishing)

• Heritage and libraries (including non-government-owned libraries, archives, cultural heritage, and natural heritage. Government-owned organizations are captured in “governance, funding, and professional support”.)

Also included are three supporting domains:

• Governance, funding, and professional support (including, among other items, all government-owned cultural venues, which are therefore not counted in other areas, e.g., heritage and libraries, live performance, visual and applied arts, etc.).

• Education and training (including cultural programs offered at educational and training establishments)

• Multi domain (including items that could not be allocated to a specific domain)

An estimate of the value added of the arts (i.e., separate from other cultural and heritage elements) is not possible from the data, because many of the above areas include elements that could be included in the arts, culture, and heritage. For example, “visual and applied arts” might sound like a domain that would fit well in the category of “arts”, but it includes architecture, advertising, and design, three subdomains that are not typically included in the arts.

The data capture direct impacts only and are therefore relatively modest. Excluded are commonly measured elements such as indirect impacts (the re-spending of the expenditures of cultural organizations) and induced impacts (the re-spending of wages earned by cultural workers and suppliers’ workers). Despite the smaller numbers, there are benefits to the narrower approach: the estimates are comparable between jurisdictions and to the GDP of other sectors of the economy.

This post analyzes Statistics Canada’s estimates of the impacts of culture products, i.e., the production of culture goods and services from establishments in both culture and non-culture industries. (See Culture and sport indicators by domain and sub-domain, by province and territory, product perspective (Table 36-10-0452-01).)

Statistics Canada also provides another set of estimates, on culture industries, which captures the production of culture and non-culture goods and services from establishments within the culture industries.

In 2020, the national culture products estimate ($56 billion, or $1,460 per capita) was 9% lower than the industries estimate ($61 billion, or $1,604 per capita).

For the per capita calculations, population data were drawn from Population estimates on July 1st, by age and sex, available at https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1710000501.