Creative Economy: A Feasible Development Option

1.4 The cross-cutting nature of creative industries11.4.1 Need for concertedinter-ministerial policiesThe creative economy extends into a wide range ofareas of political responsibility and government administration.Although many governments have set up specificministries, departments or specialized units to deal with thecreative industries, almost all areas of government policyhave some sort of interaction with these industries, includingin the following fields:■economic development: creative industries can be a significantcontributor to national economic growth, making them afocus of interest on the part of treasuries, ministries offinance and planning departments.■■■■■trade: creative goods and services comprise an importantelement in the international trade of most countries andthus come under the policy surveillance of ministries oftrade, foreign affairs and international relations.regional growth: the creative sector may be a specific target for developmentstrategies in the context of regional economic planning.labour: the employment effects of the creative industries aresignificant, making them an area of interest in labour-marketpolicy.domestic and foreign investment: private investment in creativeindustries may be encouraged or channeled in certaindirections by specific fiscal or regulatory measures.technology and communications: given the importance of newcommunication technologies to the growth of the creativeConcept and context of the creative economyBox 1.6Economics of the museum district of ParisThe economic spin-offs from museums are important. They are even more significant in the big cities, such as Paris.In 1998, nearly 12 million tourists came to Paris for various reasons: cultural, business, and recreational, among others. "Museum tourists" were definedwithin this group as those visiting at least three museums or similar institutions. Given the difficulty of identifying these visits when admission is sometimesfree, two hypotheses were constructed: a low hypothesis, according to which 2.98 million tourists had visited the museums of the Louvre, Versaillesand La Villette or Orsay, and a high hypothesis, according to which 4.2 million tourists had visited the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre and Versailles (Greffe, 1999).These tourists behaved differently depending on whether they were French or foreign. They did not spend the same number of nights in Paris. 1 In addition,their daily spending patterns were not the same: a French tourist was assumed to spend on average €121 a day for accommodation, transportationand entrance fees while a foreign tourist would spend around €151, with substantial differences from one person to the next. 2 From this, we derivedoverall spending of €1.17 billion under the low hypothesis and €1.62 billion under the high hypothesis.We then had to apply a multiplier coefficient to take account of the effect of this spending on the incomes of hotel, museum and transportation workerssince these incomes would be spent and passed on through other economic sectors successively. For this purpose, we selected Myerscough’s multipliercoefficient for London (1.4) as one of the most plausible. Total spending, then, was €1.64 billion under the low hypothesis and €2.26 billion underthe high hypothesis.It was then necessary to add in the spending on souvenirs or luxury goods that, because they are not generally produced in Paris, would not have a multipliereffect on the immediate territory but might contribute to creating jobs elsewhere in the country. Based on the same surveys, we assumed averagesouvenir spending of €45.45 for a French tourist and €75.75 for a foreign tourist. This resulted in total spending of €1.84 billion under the low hypothesisand €2.64 billion under the high hypothesis. If the cost of creating one job in the services sector is around €40,000, this amount represents a total of43,000 jobs created or maintained. If we take a lower figure (€30,000) as the cost for creating a service job, the figure for employment created or maintainedis 86,000. The first figure seems considerably more plausible since we must first deduct from this total spending the amount spent on materials.The bottom line from this type of analysis, which relies on many hypotheses, each of which reduces the reliability of the final outcome, is that the amountof this spending and the number of jobs created are very significant. 31 On average, two nights for the first group and three nights for the second. The amount of their daily spending varied with their country of origin. The French/foreign splitamong tourists was 30 per cent/70 per cent: under the low hypothesis, there were 6.3 million foreign-tourist overnights and 1.8 million French-tourist overnights, andunder the high hypothesis, the respective figures were 8.6 million and 2.6 million.2 Higher spending by Americans and Japanese offset by far the lower spending of tourists from developing countries.3 In this particular case and for the particular year in question, this amount was higher than total government spending on heritage throughout France, and the number ofjobs was nearly double that in the publicly assisted hospitals of Paris.By Xavier Greffe, Professor of Economics, University of Paris I – Panthéon-Sorbonne.CREATIVE ECONOMY REPORT 201027