Experimental statistics


Public grants in the cultural and creative industries

Summary

The statistics are based on data regarding applications and allocations from public culture funds. They concern the applications and allocations as well as success ratio, categorised by individuals and organisations. Success ratio is the ratio of accepted applications (allocations) divided by the total number or amount of applications. This publication is a part of Statistics Iceland‘s development of comprehensive statistics on public subsidies and investment in the cultural and creative industries.

Description

The figures are based on data from administrators of public culture funds regarding applications and allocations from those funds. Statistics regard the number and amount of applications and allocations, both for the total of all cultural funds and divided between each fund. Among individual applicants the numbers are broken down for age groups, sex and level of education but for organisations which apply for funds the numbers are divided by number of employees.

Objectives

This publication is a part of the development of comprehensive statistics on public subsidies and investments in the cultural and creative industries. Public culture funds are administered by various organisations and their records for applications and allocations are not standardised. Because of the number of administrators and the discrepancy in data management it has proved difficult to collect comprehensive information for all funds.

The objective of this publication is thus to deliver more detailed information about the population that applies for and receives support from public culture funds, as well as to give an example of how Statistics Iceland can use basic information from fund administrators to provide statistics by enriching their data with register data such as age, level of education and economic activities of applicants. The publication is also a part of Statistics Iceland‘s objective to increase communication with users regarding data management and usefulness of published statistics.

Success ratio in culture funds higher among legal entities

Updated: 28 September 2023

In 2022, 70% of applications to Music Fund, Music Recording Fund and Artists‘ Salary Fund came from own account workers. This ratio was highest for the Artists‘ Salary Fund, 80%, which is also the only fund which only accepts applications from individuals. In 2022, 19% of applications to the Music Recording Fund came from legal entities and 43% of applications to the Music Fund.




Dividing applications between individuals and organisations reveals a higher success ration for legal entities. In 2022 the ratio was 49% for legal entities but 33% for individuals, both private and own account workers. Looking only at own account workers, the success ratio was 46% in 2022, but for legal entities the ratio was higher or 68% for those with one employee and 59% for those with more than one employee.

Only 68% of applicants considered employed
Looking only at applications from individuals, 68% of them came from those who are considered as employed according to PAYE register data, that is those with any income from employment accounted for in the Icelandic tax authority settlement of withholding taxes, including those on maternity leave from work and those with calculated remuneration.

Number of applications from 15-35 year olds increasing
The ratio of applications from 15-35 year olds increased from 2016-2022 while decreasing in other age groups. In 2022, 43% of applications thus came from 15-35 year olds, 49% from 36-60 year olds and 9% from 61 year old or older, while the ratio was 35%, 54% and 12% in 2016. The number of allocations has developed in a similar way and the success ratio for all age groups has decreased by about 30%. For almost the entire period the success ratio has been higher among 36-60 year olds than for 15-35 year olds.




Between 2016 and 2022, there were almost no changes to the ratio of applications between different levels of education. The numbers further suggest that the level of education does not have numerable impact on the success ratio.

Objectives of the publication
For this first release the numbers are based on data from three cultural funds and therefore they only concern a small part of the whole portion of the total. In addition, a decision was made to only include a part of the available variables at this time, but other variables could be added later, such as regions and economic activies.

The statistics are a part of Statice‘s objective to increase communication with users regarding data management and usefulness of published statistics. The publication is also a part of a development project supported by the Icelandic Student Innovation Fund.


Statistics

Public grants in the cultural and creative industries 20230928 (xlsx)


Metadata

The numbers are preliminary and subject to change over time. The numbers are based both on data received from fund administrators and on Statistics Iceland‘s register data. Data from fund administrators is quality checked and cleaned before it is enriched with register data.

There are some shortcomings to the administrator‘s data, for instance because of typhographical errors. Because of this numbers might differ between Statistics Iceland and those published by the administrators themselves.

Applicants are divided into three groups: a) own account workers, b) legal entities and c) private individuals. Numbers on individuals include groups a) and c) and numbers of organisations include both a) and b)

Information regarding age and sex of applicants comes from Statistics Iceland‘s population data. Gender is divided in three categories and the age refers to January 1st each year.

Categorisation of level of education is based on ÍSMENNT2011, which is based on ISCED2011.

Number of individuals in PAYE register refers to applicants who are employed according to monthly pay-as-you-earn register, those with any income from employment accounted for in the Icelandic tax authority settlement of withholding taxes, including those on maternity leave from work and those with calculated remuneration.

Number of employees comes from StatIce‘s business register and refers to the average number of employees in the months that employees were employed.


Use of these experimental statistics is free. Please quote the source.
For further information please contact erla.r.gudmundsdottir@hagstofa.is, tel. +354 528 11052