Insights for policymakers
The creative industries have experienced a glorious decade punctuated by a challenging year. Over the last 10 years, the sector has grown at a rate more than twice that of the total UK economy and in 2018 contributed £111.7bn, accounting for 5.8 per cent of total UK GVA. Moreover, with the fourth industrial revolution in full swing, creative skills are set to be in high demand in the economy more generally with the number of creative jobs predicted to increase dramatically as AI and automation reduce the need for routine labour.
Yet despite the fundamental importance of highly skilled creative workers to the creative industries’ ability to generate extraordinary growth, UK higher education’s provision of training in creative subjects is currently being placed under threat. The recommendations of the Augar Review – that subjects which fail to provide ‘value for money’ should receive less government subsidy – has worried practitioners, recipients and beneficiaries of creative education since its publication in 2019. This has been compounded by recent announcements from government that university bailouts could be contingent on the dropping of ‘low value’ courses which could on some measures place creative education squarely in the firing line. This is because, according to a recent report from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), commissioned by the Department for Education, lifetime earnings for those who studied a creative arts and design degree are no better than for those who didn’t go to university at all, meaning that these courses could be seen as offering low value for money, both for the graduates taking these courses and for the tax payer.
Using new research, by the PEC’s researchers at the University of Sussex, this policy briefing demonstrates the value of creative higher education by establishing a clear link between studying a creative subject at university and gaining meaningful graduate employment in creative work. This, in turn, points out the issues with current policy discourse’s reliance on salary data as an indicator of Higher Education’s value for money and suggests that disruptions to the creative talent pipeline would likely damage the sustainability of the UK’s fast growing creative industries and other sectors which increasingly rely on creative work.
Please reference this paper as:
Bloom, M. and Bakhshi, H. (2020) Policy Insight: Graduate motivations. London: Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre and University of Sussex. Available from: https://www.pec.ac.uk/policy-briefings/graduate-motivations-and-the-economic-returns-of-creative-higher-education-inside-and-outside-the-creative-industries
Published 31st July 2020
Photo by Retha Ferguson
Related Policy Briefings
Policy Brief: Transitioning to Sustainable Production across the UK Theatre Sector
This policy brief outlines recommendations for transitioning to more sustainable theatre production …
Authors’ Earnings in the UK
This policy briefing sets out areas for possible policy action, proposed by the researchers at CREAT…
Television production, international trade and pressures to consolidate
The UK television production sector is one of Britain’s leading creative export sectors. This briefi…
Three ways to support growth in the creative industries
Three ways to support growth in the creative industries The Creative Industries are an economic powe…
Policy briefing: Creative industries innovation in seaside resorts and country towns
This policy brief is based on a PEC Discussion Paper: Creative Industries Innovation in Seaside Reso…
Policy Briefing: R&D in the Creative Industries
The creative industries are one of the fastest growing sectors of the UK economy. One in eight UK bu…
A global agenda from the PEC’s International Council
You can now read the report in A Global Agenda for the Cultural and Creative Industries is the …
The birth of neo-regulation. Where next for the UK’s approach to platform regulation?
A new era of tech regulation is about to begin. However, planned legislation is leading to a tension…
Placemaking, Culture and Covid
In September 2021, we consulted a Panel of our Industry Champions on their experiences of …
The Creative Industries in the UK’s Export Strategy
This brief is based upon the findings of our latest research into the features and barriers facing t…
How to design a creative higher education system that supports economic needs
As the UK emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic, the Government is faced with important policy decision…
Creative places: Growing the creative industries across the UK
This is in part because of the economic importance of the sector: one in eight UK businesses are par…
