Project Overview

AEP6 is the sixth economic impact study of the nonprofit arts and culture industry in the U.S. This study is conducted approximately every five years to gauge the economic impact (on employment, government revenue, and household income) of spending by nonprofit arts and culture organizations and the event-related spending by their audiences. Previous studies were published in 1994, 2002, 2007, 2012, and 2017. (Due to the unique nature of the realities of the global COVID-19 pandemic, the AEP6 study was postponed for 16 months.)

In 2017, the previous study, AEP5, documented that the nonprofit arts and culture industry generated $166.3 billion in economic activity (spending by organizations plus the event-related spending by their audiences) which supported 4.6 million jobs and generated $27.5 billion in government revenue. The AEP series demonstrates that an investment in the arts provides both cultural and economic benefits.

• Nonprofit arts and culture organizations are businesses. They employ people locally, purchase goods and services from within the community, are members of their Chambers of Commerce, and attract tourists to their regions.
   
• The arts drive commerce to local businesses. The arts, unlike most industries, leverage significant amounts of event-related spending by their audiences. In 2017, arts attendees spent $31.47 per person, per event, beyond the cost of admission on items such as meals, parking, and lodging—vital income for local businesses.
   
• Arts travelers are ideal tourists. They stay longer and spend more to seek out authentic cultural experiences. One-third of attendees travel from outside the county in which the activity takes place and spend an average of $48 per person. (69% say they traveled specifically to attend the activity.)
   
• Small investments. Big returns. In 2017, the combined $5 billion in direct arts funding by local, state, and federal governments yielded $27.5 billion in government revenue

Additional Resources:

• Project Timeline
• 2-Page Project Summary
• Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

What's Happening Right Now

During JULY, AUGUST, AND SEPTEMBER 2023:

• The national findings will be released on October 12, 2023. A new website dedicated to the Arts & Economic Prosperity 6 study will go live on October 12.

• The Americans for the Arts research team is organizing, reviewing, and analyzing the survey data.
  • The local and statewide research partners collected a total of 224,677 valid audience-intercept surveys.
    • 68% were collected using traditional paper surveys, and 32% were collected electronically (e.g. using QR codes).
    • 17% were collected at events that were presented, produced, and/or hosted by an organization that primarily serves a Community of Color.
    • The traditional paper survey was translated into 24 languages; the electronic versions were available in both English and Spanish.
  • In collaboration with the local and statewide research partners, we've collected budget and attendance information from 16,510 eligible nonprofit arts and culture organizations.
    • Organizations that completed the full version of the survey provided information about revenues, expenditures, in-person attendance, virtual attendance, staff size, and volunteers. The survey also captured information about community and social impact, organizational leadership, mission/primary purpose, and the community served.
    • An abbreviated version of the survey (deployed near the end of the data collection process) collected information about expenditures and in-person attendance only.

• In collaboration with the AEP6 Equity Task Force, and based on feedback from the local and statewide research partners, Dr. Genna Styles-Lyas, Director of AEP6 Community Engagement & Equity, has developed a series of community engagement resources. The purpose of this series is to assist the partners with identifying, connecting with, and building authentic relationships with BIPOC and ALAANA arts and culture organizations in their community.
  • Engaging With Your Community
    • A guide to support the AEP6 partners through intentional and actionable steps to build community advocates, have engaging conversations, and create sustainable relationships that will last beyond AEP6.
  • Making Connections with BIPOC & ALAANA Arts and Culture Organizations
    • A guide to assist the AEP6 partners with identifying BIPOC and ALAANA arts and culture organizations, and make meaningful and trustworthy connections with them.
  • Maintaining & Strengthening Committed Community Connections
    • A workbook/microsite designed to support the AEP6 partners as they build genuine and authentic relationship with BIPOC and ALAANA arts and culture organizations. This tool is a result of research, practitioner experience, and community engagement with our research partners.

The Participating Communities

The AEP6 study is being conducted in partnership with local and state research partners representing the 373 participating communities. Each community will receive a customized report based on their own surveys of nonprofit arts and culture organizations and their audiences. An economic model will be tailored for each community to provide specific data about the industry’s impact on local jobs and government revenue. Reports will have many features including cross-community comparisons with other AEP6 communities, analyses of how spending differs between resident attendees and cultural tourists, and clear explanations of the methodology and how to use the data effectively.

Centering Equity & Inclusion 

Americans for the Arts is committed to addressing equity and inclusion as a critical component of the methodology, organizational participation, and collection of data for AEP6 by centering and representing BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) and ALAANA (African, Latinx, Asian, Arab, Native American) identifying communities—a segment of the nonprofit arts and culture sector that has been underrepresented in past studies.

AEP6 is making a significant expansion beyond its previous iterations by centering equity and inclusion across the study. This change is more than simply responding to a priority. It is transforming the study—a full shake-out of the methodology to reduce systemic bias in survey design, data collection, and analysis; establishing a new local, state, and national partnership model; community engagement and communications strategies; and the creation of new narratives based on the study results.

For the first time, AEP6 will establish a benchmark of arts and culture organizations that primarily serve communities of color, and the audiences that attend their events. It will also identify organizations that have a chief executive who identifies as BIPOC or ALAANA. Researchers will use the data to calculate the economic impact of the BIPOC and ALAANA arts sector.

AEP6 Equity Consultant

The Miles Partnership has been added to the project team as AEP6 equity consultants to support our commitment to centering diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility into the project methodology. 

AEP6 Equity Task Force

An AEP6 Equity Task Force was created that includes participating research partners, individuals representing the BIPOC and ALAANA organizations that will be surveyed, funders, researchers, and other arts leaders to guide the development and implementation of an Equity Framework.

Director of AEP6 Community Engagement & Equity

Dr. Genna Styles-Lyas joined the AEP6 project team in this new position created to focus on and drive the implementation of the AEP6 study's equity and inclusion initiatives, support the local and state research partners in engaging with and encouraging the support of their BIPOC and ALAANA arts community, tracking the success of the local data collection efforts, creating training and enhancement opportunities for the research partners, and evaluating the outcomes of the study.

Language and Identity

Americans for the Arts believes that language and identity go hand-in-hand and are essential to how we name and organize any community. We use the terms BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) and ALAANA (African, Latinx, Asian, Arab, Native American) to represent People of Color and Communities of Color. While these terms do not fully encompass or represent the complicated and multi-layered nature of indigeneity or ethnic and racial identities, they are the most commonly used terms in our work. We invite and encourage you to examine and explore the terms used in your community and that are important and valued by individuals you interact with, support, and engage. Americans for the Arts has a Language Bank that we use to organize terminology related to our work. In addition, Americans for the Arts endorses and is working to uphold the actions and principles outlined in the Cultural New Deal to improve conditions for and with the priority communities listed therein.

Data Collection

To accomplish AEP6, a customized economic impact study is completed for each of the participating communities. In each community, a research partner organization is identified to assist Americans for the Arts with two primary data collection efforts: an audience-intercept survey of attendees to arts and culture events that take place in the community, and a budget and attendance survey of the comprehensive universe of nonprofit arts and culture organizations that exist in the community.

Each participating community receives a final report customized for their survey data and based on an economic input-output model tailored for their specific local economy. Researchers then use the localized findings to extrapolate national impact estimates for the entire nonprofit arts and culture industry.

The Audience Survey

Audience surveys were collected from attendees at performances, events, exhibits, venues, and facilities from May 1, 2022 through July 18, 2023.

• Questions 1-7 are the core economic impact questions about the expenditures related to attending the event.
• Question 8 is a scale that captures the respondents’ level of agreement with four statements that will add a social impact component to the data collection.
• Questions 9-13 capture the respondents’ demographic characteristics (optional).

The survey is available in multiple formats and translations:

• English language survey (all versions of the survey)
• Spanish language survey (all versions of the survey)
• 24 additional translations (of the paper survey) are available due to requests from the local and state research partners
• Customized QR Codes are available for all participating communities (to allow respondents to use their own smart devices while attending an activity)
• Customized URL versions of the survey have also been created (for use as a "kiosk-mode survey" on tablet computers such as iPads that are provided to attendees while attending an activity)
• A large-font format is available in both the QR Code and URL versions of the customized surveys

The local and state research partners each received detailed and customized surveying instructions to support the data collection requirements. In addition, the AEP6 project team held a survey training webinar on April 21. This training was recorded and the recording was shared with the research partners. 

The Organizational Survey

Each of the local and state research partners has compiled a comprehensive list of the eligible nonprofit arts and culture organizations that are located in their community. To assist the research partners with the development of their comprehensive list of eligible organizations, a "Starter List" was provided for each partner. For partners representing communities located in New England (CT, ME, MA, NH, RI, and VT), the "Starter List" was created using data shared from CreativeGround, an dynamic directory from the New England Foundation for the Arts that celebrates New England's artists, creatives, culture bearers, arts and culture organizations, and creative businesses. For partners representing communities located in all other states and territories, the "Starter List" was based on data licensed from the Candid database (formerly GuideStar and Foundation Center). The research partners then supplemented their list using their own databases and mailing lists, as well as by implementing the strategies outlined in the AEP6 community engagement resources.

Using the final lists compiled by the research partners, Americans for the Arts distributed a web-based survey to all eligible organizations on February 27, 2023 The survey process continued through August 4, 2023.

• In addition to background information about each organization, the survey will collect information about each organization's revenues, expenditures, in-person attendance, virtual attendance, staff size, and volunteers.
• The survey includes a series of diversity and inclusion questions designed to identify organizations that primarily serve a Community of Color and organizations that have a chief executive who identifies as a Person of Color.
• The survey is available in English and Spanish.
• The length and complexity of the survey varies depending on the budget size of each responding organization. The survey questions can be downloaded using the links below.