IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp14421.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Creativity Premium

Author

Listed:
  • Gill, David

    (Purdue University)

  • Prowse, Victoria L.

    (Purdue University)

Abstract

Success in life increasingly depends on key skills that allow people to thrive in education, the labor market, and their interactions with others. In this paper, we emphasize creativity as a key skill that is essential to open-ended problem solving and resistant to automation. We use rich longitudinal data to study the relationship between people's creativity measured in childhood and their individual attributes and life outcomes. We find that childhood creativity predicts labor market and educational success: more creative individuals earn more during the course of their careers, work in higher occupational categories, and reach higher levels of educational attainment. Our analysis of attributes further suggests that creative individuals have a package of practical skills that allows them to thrive in work environments where learning from experience is important. We combine insights from our findings with evidence from psychology to propose creativity-improving interventions that could lead to substantial economic benefits.

Suggested Citation

  • Gill, David & Prowse, Victoria L., 2021. "The Creativity Premium," IZA Discussion Papers 14421, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14421
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp14421.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. David Mcgranahan & Timothy Wojan, 2007. "Recasting the Creative Class to Examine Growth Processes in Rural and Urban Counties," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(2), pages 197-216.
    2. Eduardo Fé & David Gill & Victoria Prowse, 2022. "Cognitive Skills, Strategic Sophistication, and Life Outcomes," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 130(10), pages 2643-2704.
    3. Florian Ederer & Gustavo Manso, 2013. "Is Pay for Performance Detrimental to Innovation?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(7), pages 1496-1513, July.
    4. Katharina Eckartz & Oliver Kirchkamp & Daniel Schunk, 2012. "How do Incentives Affect Creativity?," CESifo Working Paper Series 4049, CESifo.
    5. Lucas, Robert Jr., 1988. "On the mechanics of economic development," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 3-42, July.
    6. Charlotta Mellander & Richard Florida, 2011. "Creativity, talent, and regional wages in Sweden," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 46(3), pages 637-660, June.
    7. Glenn Dutcher & Cortney S. Rodet, 2022. "Which two heads are better than one? Uncovering the positive effects of diversity in creative teams," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(4), pages 884-897, November.
    8. Sanjiv Erat & Uri Gneezy, 2016. "Incentives for creativity," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 19(2), pages 269-280, June.
    9. Ann Markusen, 2006. "Urban Development and the Politics of a Creative Class: Evidence from a Study of Artists," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 38(10), pages 1921-1940, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Roberto Antonietti, 2011. "From creativity to innovativeness: micro evidence from Italy," Openloc Working Papers 1117, Public policies and local development.
    2. Emanuela Marrocu & Raffaele Paci, 2013. "Regional Development and Creativity," International Regional Science Review, , vol. 36(3), pages 354-391, July.
    3. Teemu Makkonen, 2012. "The competitive advantage of a peripheral university town: Human and social capital perspectives from Joensuu, Finland," ERSA conference papers ersa12p621, European Regional Science Association.
    4. Michael Fritsch & Michael Stützer, 2012. "The Geography of Creative People in Germany revisited," Jena Economics Research Papers 2012-065, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena.
    5. Cortney S. Rodet, 2021. "The wellspring of creativity? Using divergent‐thinking tasks to understand creative characteristics," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 42(6), pages 1435-1453, September.
    6. Brunow, Stephan & Birkeneder, Antonia & Rodriguez-Pose, Andrés, 2017. "Creative and science oriented employees and firm innovation : a key for smarter cities?," IAB-Discussion Paper 201724, Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany].
    7. Englmaier, Florian & Grimm, Stefan & Schindler, David & Schudy, Simeon, 2018. "The Effect of Incentives in Non-Routine Analytical Team Tasks - Evidence From a Field Experiment," Rationality and Competition Discussion Paper Series 71, CRC TRR 190 Rationality and Competition.
    8. Eckhardt Bode & Lucia Perez Villar, 2017. "Creativity, education or what? On the measurement of regional human capital," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 96, pages 51-67, March.
    9. Brunow, Stephan & Birkeneder, Antonia & Rodríguez-Pose, Andrés, 2018. "Creative and science-oriented employees and firm-level innovation," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 87588, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    10. Ron A. Boschma & Michael Fritsch, 2009. "Creative Class and Regional Growth: Empirical Evidence from Seven European Countries," Economic Geography, Clark University, vol. 85(4), pages 391-423, October.
    11. Emanuela Marrocu & Raffaele Paci, 2011. "Education or just Creativity: what matters most for economic performance?," ERSA conference papers ersa11p199, European Regional Science Association.
    12. Joaquin Artes & Jennifer Graves & Meryl Motika, 2019. "Creativity under Pressure: Performance Payments, Task Type and Productivity," Working Papers 20190028, New York University Abu Dhabi, Department of Social Science, revised Oct 2019.
    13. Wentao Yu & Jin Hong & Yanrui Wu & Dingtao Zhao, 2013. "Emerging Geography of Creativity and Labor Productivity Effects in China," China & World Economy, Institute of World Economics and Politics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, vol. 21(5), pages 78-99, September.
    14. Richard Florida & Charlotta Mellander & Patrick Adler, 2011. "The Creative Class Paradigm," Chapters, in: David Emanuel Andersson & Åke E. Andersson & Charlotta Mellander (ed.), Handbook of Creative Cities, chapter 3, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    15. Silvia Cerisola & Elisa Panzera, 2021. "Cultural and Creative Cities and Regional Economic Efficiency: Context Conditions as Catalyzers of Cultural Vibrancy and Creative Economy," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(13), pages 1-23, June.
    16. Richard Florida, 2014. "The Creative Class and Economic Development," Economic Development Quarterly, , vol. 28(3), pages 196-205, August.
    17. Florian Englmaier & Stefan Grimm & Dominik Grothe & David Schindler & Simeon Schudy, 2018. "The Effect of Incentives in Non-Routine Analytical Team Tasks," CESifo Working Paper Series 6903, CESifo.
    18. Roberto Antonietti, 2015. "Does Local Creative Employment Affect Firm Innovativeness? Microeconometric Evidence from Italy," SCIENZE REGIONALI, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2015(3), pages 5-29.
    19. Francisco De Lima Cavalcanti & Raul Da Mota Silveira Neto, 2016. "Creative Class, Human Capital And Urban Dynamism: Empirical Evidence For The Brazilian Cities," Anais do XLII Encontro Nacional de Economia [Proceedings of the 42nd Brazilian Economics Meeting] 160, ANPEC - Associação Nacional dos Centros de Pós-Graduação em Economia [Brazilian Association of Graduate Programs in Economics].
    20. Benslimane, Ismaël & Crosetto, Paolo & Magni-Berton, Raul & Varaine, Simon, 2023. "Intellectual property reform in the laboratory," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 206(C), pages 204-221.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    creativity; skills; life outcomes; children; longitudinal; labor market; wages; earnings; occupational category; educational attainment; practical skills; experience; cognitive ability; human capital;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:iza:izadps:dp14421. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: . General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    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: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    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.