Union demands proof for Government’s estimate that Job Keeper and Job Seeker will boost arts industry by $4bn-$10bn
The industry’s union has accused Communications, Cyber Safety and Arts Minister Paul Fletcher of potentially pulling the estimated impact of the Job Keeper and Job Seeker programs on the arts sector – which Fletcher says is between $4bn and $10bn – “out of thin air”.
The Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance (MEAA) said its own research was in stark contrast with that estimate, urging the Minister to produce the modelling data for his estimation. In response, a spokesperson for the Minister has told Mumbrella the estimate is based on a working paper published two years ago.
Minister Fletcher
You lost me at “Union Demands”.
So you didn’t read the article, but went straight to comment instead.
An uninformed decision, much like the Ministers.
Have a read of the white paper. What they include in ‘Cultural and Creative Industries’ is extremely broad.
When the layperson talks about ‘the arts’ the general perception is performance, art, literature and film.
‘Design’ is the largest (just under 50%) followed by Fashion (about 10%).
My two favourites were Environmental Heritage (very important culturally but not really ‘the arts’) and when discussing Fashion that “Clothing and footwear wholesaling and retailing have driven the increase in absolute terms”. Now I know that selling Manolo Blahniks can be an art form at that price … but c’mon … really.
The ‘talk the numbers up’ disease is all pervasive. So the question is did the Minister know the basis of this report, and if so why did he use the ‘top-line’, and if he didn’t know then why not before he commented.
I have read the BCAR report. I think both Mumbrella and MEAA should as it would answer their questions. $4b to $10b would seem a reasonable estimate for Jobkeeper for the entire Cultural and Creative sector as defined in the report. The sector as defined contributes $111.7b to GDP. The report is less than two years old so it is current. The sector as defined does include the entire printing industry; radio, tv, film and digital media; the entire publishing industry; the fashion industry; etc….. The report does include breakdowns for all the different parts of the sector. Jobkeeper is far from perfect but it is keeping a lot of us afloat.