policy and advocacy

Issue Brief - National Endowment for the Arts

Promoting Creativity and Public Access to the Arts

ACTION NEEDED
We urge Congress to support a budget of $170 million for the NEA in the FY06 Interior Appropriations bill to:

• Expand the NEA’s ability to serve the public and increase public participation in the arts by nurturing the growth and artistic excellence of thousands of arts organizations in every corner of the country. An increase would equally support the creation, preservation and presentation of the arts in America and the Challenge America initiative, which uses the arts to enhance America’s communities through grants for arts education, youth-at-risk, cultural preservation, community arts partnerships and improved access to the arts for all Americans.
• Fund the American Masterpieces initiative.

Table: NEA Annual Appropriations, FY90 to Present (in millions of dollars)
Note:  Figures are not adjusted for inflation.  Source:  NEA

TALKING POINTS

• The NEA is a great investment in the economic growth of every community in the country.  The nonprofit arts industry generates $134 billion annually in economic activity, supports 4.85 million full-time equivalent jobs, and returns $10.5 billion to the federal government in income taxes.  Measured against direct federal cultural spending of about $1.4 billion, that’s a return of nearly eight to one. (Source: Arts & Economic Prosperity, Americans for the Arts, 2002.)  Investment in the NEA provides economic growth and fights the federal deficit.
• The arts attract new tourism dollars.  Public support of cultural tourism plays a critical role in community revitalization as well as the surge in tourism - one of the fastest growing economic markets in the country today.  Sixty-five percent of U.S. travelers include cultural events on their trips.  These travelers spend an average of $38.05 per event in addition to the cost of admission - 75 percent more than their local counterparts – on event-related items such as meals, parking, and retail sales.  Local attendees spend an impressive $21.75 per person per event.  (Sources:  The Historic/Cultural Traveler 2001 (TravelScope Survey), Travel Industry Association of America, 2001; Arts & Economic Prosperity, Americans for the Arts, 2002.)
• Public spending on the arts helps position the United States to compete globally. America’s arts and entertainment are leading exports, with estimates of more than $30 billion annually in overseas sales, including the output of artists and other creative workers in the audiovisual, music and recording, and entertainment businesses. In order to maintain an ongoing global position of economic strength and leadership, the federal investment in creative capital is increasingly important.  The nonprofit arts foster creativity that feeds not only the arts, but business and technology as well.
• Federal funding for the arts is critical to leveraging private funding.  On average, each NEA grant generates at least seven dollars from other sources.  Government cultural funding plays a leadership role that is essential in generating private support for the arts.
• The NEA supports lifelong learning in the arts. This includes a wide range of projects, including educational programs for adults, collaborations between state arts agencies and state education agencies, and partnerships between arts institutions and educators.  Arts education has been proven to help students increase cognitive development, inspire motivation and discipline, develop confidence and inventiveness, and hone communication and problem-solving skills. Students with an education rich in the arts have better grade point averages, score better on standardized tests, and have lower dropout rates – findings that cut across all socio-economic categories.  (Source:  Critical Links:  Learning in the Arts and Student Academic and Social Development, Arts Education Partnership, 2002.)
• Arts education programs funded by the NEA deter delinquent behavior in at-risk youth. The NEA has provided leadership in demonstrating that arts programs designed to deter delinquent behavior of at-risk youth dramatically improve academic performance; reduce school truancy; and increase communication skills, conflict resolution, completion of challenging tasks, and teamwork. (Source: YouthARTS Development Project, Juvenile Justice Bulletin, U.S. Department of Justice, May 2001, in partnership with the NEA.)
• The stability of federal funding is important to the arts. While support for the arts – foundation, corporate, and individual donations, as well as earned income – has fluctuated over several years, and with state and local government support only beginning to recover from recent cuts, but still below former levels – public needs are greater than ever.  The stability of federal funding is all the more important to the arts in a time of fiscal fluctuations.
• The NEA nurtures the growth and artistic excellence of thousands of arts organizations and artists in every corner of the country, preserving and enhancing our nation’s diverse cultural heritage and making the performing, visual, literary, media, and folk arts available to millions of Americans.  The public investment in the nation's cultural life results in both new and classic works of art reaching all 50 states.
• Challenge America is the primary vehicle ensuring that NEA direct grants reach underserved populations as well as congressional districts that did not receive grants in prior years.  In 2004, the NEA provided direct grants in 99 percent of all congressional districts.
• American Masterpieces: Three Centuries of Artistic Genius, is a program that will combine arts presentations with education programming to provide Americans with access to their cultural and artistic legacy.

BACKGROUND
A unique combination of federal, state, and local governments; private business; and the nonprofit sector provides an infrastructure for the arts that is critical to the economic vitality of state and local communities and to our nation’s cultural well-being.  The NEA awards more than 1,000 grants each year to nonprofit arts organizations for projects that encourage artistic creativity and that bring the arts to millions of Americans.  In a striking example of federal/state partnership, 40 percent of NEA’s program dollars are granted to state arts agencies, ensuring that every Congressional district/state receives federal funds.  These grants, combined with state legislative appropriations and other dollars, are distributed widely to strengthen states’ arts infrastructures and ensure broad access to the arts.

The American public favors spending federal tax dollars in support of the arts, as evidenced by bipartisan support in the House and Senate. Unfortunately, the NEA is funded at only $121.3 million in the present fiscal year (FY05); it has never recovered from a 40 percent budget cut in FY96, and its programs are seriously under funded.  It has had only small incremental increases in the past five years.  A total appropriation of $170 million for FY06 would nearly restore the agency to its 1990 level of $171 million, which was then equal to 69 cents per capita.  In 2005, 15 years later, the federal government spends only 41 cents per capita.  If adjusted for inflation, this per capita spending cut would be even deeper.