IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/ratsoc/v8y1996i1p5-24.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Do Artists Suffer From A Cost-Disease?

Author

Listed:
  • Tyler Cowen
  • Robin Grier

Abstract

We consider the Baumol-Bowen cost-disease argument from the perspective of an artist's occupational choice. Both theory and evidence suggest that the incentives to create art do not diminish and probably increase in a growing market economy. First, countervailing factors may check or limit the operation of the cost-disease. Second, artists can increase their productivity by generating new ideas. New ideas provide the base for all productivity improvements, whether in the arts or in industry. Third, the arts are not necessarily labor-intensive, as cost-disease proponents allege. Fourth, the available statistical evidence implies that economic growth has favorable effects on artistic production.

Suggested Citation

  • Tyler Cowen & Robin Grier, 1996. "Do Artists Suffer From A Cost-Disease?," Rationality and Society, , vol. 8(1), pages 5-24, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:ratsoc:v:8:y:1996:i:1:p:5-24
    DOI: 10.1177/104346396008001001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/104346396008001001
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/104346396008001001?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Romer, Paul M, 1986. "Increasing Returns and Long-run Growth," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(5), pages 1002-1037, October.
    2. Bhagwati, Jagdish N. & Hamada, Koichi, 1982. "Tax policy in the presence of emigration," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(3), pages 291-317, August.
    3. Baumol, William J & Blackman, Sue Anne Batey & Wolff, Edward N, 1985. "Unbalanced Growth Revisited: Asymptotic Stagnancy and New Evidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 75(4), pages 806-817, September.
    4. Throsby, David, 1994. "The Production and Consumption of the Arts: A View of Cultural Economics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 32(1), pages 1-29, March.
    5. Baumol, William J., 1982. "The income distribution frontier and taxation of migrants," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(3), pages 343-361, August.
    6. Gapinski, James H, 1984. "The Economics of Performing Shakespeare," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(3), pages 458-466, June.
    7. Charles Wolf, 1973. "Heresies About Time: Wasted Time, Double-Duty Time, and Past Time," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 87(4), pages 661-667.
    8. William J. Baumol, 1973. "Income and Substitution Effects in the Linder Theorem," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 87(4), pages 629-633.
    9. David M. Gould & Roy J. Ruffin & Graeme L. Woodbridge, 1993. "The theory and practice of free trade," Economic and Financial Policy Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, issue Dec, pages 1-16.
    10. Gapinski, James H, 1980. "The Production of Culture," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 62(4), pages 578-586, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Seaman, Bruce A., 2009. "Cultural Economics: The State of the Art and Perspectives/Economía de la cultura: estado del arte y perspectivas," Estudios de Economia Aplicada, Estudios de Economia Aplicada, vol. 27, pages 7-32, Abril.
    2. Bruce A. Seaman, 2013. "The role of the private sector in cultural heritage," Chapters, in: Ilde Rizzo & Anna Mignosa (ed.), Handbook on the Economics of Cultural Heritage, chapter 5, pages i-i, Edward Elgar Publishing.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Tyler Cowen, 1996. "Why I do not believe in the cost-disease," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 20(3), pages 207-214, September.
    2. Castiglione, Concetta & Infante, Davide & Zieba, Marta, 2023. "Public support for performing arts. Efficiency and productivity gains in eleven European countries," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    3. Marc Bourreau & Michel Gensollen & François Moreau & Patrick Waelbroeck, 2013. "“Selling less of more?” The impact of digitization on record companies," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 37(3), pages 327-346, August.
    4. Goya, Daniel, 2022. "Marshallian and Jacobian Externalities in Creative Industries," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 11962, Inter-American Development Bank.
    5. Fedderke, Johannes W., 2018. "Exploring unbalanced growth: Understanding the sectoral structure of the South African economy," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 177-189.
    6. Michael Peneder & Karl Aiginger & Gernot Hutschenreiter & Markus Marterbauer, 2001. "Structural Change and Economic Growth," WIFO Studies, WIFO, number 20668, April.
    7. Tatiana V. Abankina & Pavel V. Derkachev & Liudmila M. Filatova & Irina V. Scherbakova, 2015. "Aspects of Increasing Accessibility of Russian Museums and Evaluation of Attendance," HSE Working papers WP BRP 43/MAN/2015, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    8. Víctor Fernández-Blanco & Ana Rodríguez-Álvarez & Aleksandra Wiśniewska, 2019. "Measuring technical efficiency and marginal costs in the performing arts: the case of the municipal theatres of Warsaw," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 43(1), pages 97-119, March.
    9. Víctor Fernández-Blanco & Ana Rodríguez-Álvarez, 2018. "Measuring allocative efficiency in Cultural Economics: the case of “Fundación Princesa de Asturias” (The Princess of Asturias Foundation)," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 42(1), pages 91-110, February.
    10. Ozhegova, A. & Ozhegov, E., 2018. "Estimation of Demand Function for Performing Arts: Empirical Analysis," Journal of the New Economic Association, New Economic Association, vol. 37(1), pages 87-110.
    11. Herbertsson, Tryggvi Thor, 2003. "Accounting for human capital externalities with an application to the Nordic countries," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 47(3), pages 553-567, June.
    12. Marta Zieba & Carol Newman, 2012. "Organisational Structure and Managerial Efficiency: A quasi-experimental analysis of German public theatres," Working Papers WP032012, University of Limerick, Department of Economics, revised Oct 2012.
    13. Evgeniy M. Ozhegov & Alina Ozhegova, 2017. "Regression Tree Model for Analysis of Demand with Heterogeneity and Censorship," HSE Working papers WP BRP 174/EC/2017, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    14. Marta Zieba, 2013. "Is theatre efficiency affected by the legal form type? A case study of German public theatres," Working Papers WP032013, University of Limerick, Department of Economics, revised Jul 2013.
    15. Matthias Figo & Peter Mayerhofer, 2015. "Strukturwandel und regionales Wachstum - wissensintensive Unternehmensdienste als Wachstumsmotor?," Working Paper Reihe der AK Wien - Materialien zu Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft 145, Kammer für Arbeiter und Angestellte für Wien, Abteilung Wirtschaftswissenschaft und Statistik.
    16. Alina R. Buzanakova & Evgeniy M. Ozhegov, 2016. "Demand for Performing Arts: The Effect of Unobserved Quality on Price Elasticity," HSE Working papers WP BRP 156/EC/2016, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    17. VÍctor Blanco & JosÉ BaÑos Pino, 1997. "Cinema Demand in Spain: A Cointegration Analysis," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 21(1), pages 57-75, March.
    18. Djajic, Slobodan & Milbourne, Ross, 1985. "An Equilibrium Model of Guest-Worker Migration," Queen's Institute for Economic Research Discussion Papers 275203, Queen's University - Department of Economics.
    19. Frey, Bruno S. & Meier, Stephan, 2006. "The Economics of Museums," Handbook of the Economics of Art and Culture, in: V.A. Ginsburgh & D. Throsby (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Art and Culture, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 29, pages 1017-1047, Elsevier.
    20. Andreas Dietrich, 2012. "Does growth cause structural change, or is it the other way around? A dynamic panel data analysis for seven OECD countries," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 43(3), pages 915-944, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:ratsoc:v:8:y:1996:i:1:p:5-24. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.