In 2020, 12,700 people 16-74 years old are estimated to have been in cultural employment, according to the Icelandic Labour Force Survey (IS-LFS), or 6.7% of total employment.1 The ratio decreased slightly from 2019 when it was 6.8%. The number of people in cultural employment decreased proportionally more than those in other employment, or 4.5% compared with 2.8%.
Within that group, just over 70% were employed in cultural industries, while one third was in cultural occupations in other industries. Within cultural industries, a little over half was in a cultural occupation while a little under half was in another occupation within cultural industries.
Looking at status in cultural employment, the number of people working both as employees and as self-employed2 decreased proportionally most between 2019 and 2020, or by 25%. In 2020 they amounted to 9.4% of the total in cultural employment, compared with 2.4% in other employment.
The number of self-employed within culture also decreased significantly between 2019 and 2020, from 27.8% to 23.6%. The proportion was just over 10% in other employment both in 2019 and 2020.
The number of employees in culture increased in total by 3.7% between 2019 and 2020, with the number of male employees increasing by 13.9% and the number of female employees decreasing by 4.4%. For other employment, the number of employees decreased by 2.7%. Thereof the number of men by 3.6% and women by 1.7%.
Between 2019 and 2020, the number of women in cultural employment decreased considerably more than men, irrespective of status in employment. In total the number of women decreased by 16.9% between 2019 and 2020 while the number of men in cultural employment increased by 9.7%. The only status in employment in which the number of men in cultural employment decreased was amongst those self-employed where the decrease was 9.5%.
Most decrease in sound recording and music publishing
According to register-based employment, 3.1% of total employment was in cultural industries in 2020. The number decreased by 7.1% between 2019 and 2020, compared with 4.8% in other industries. Within cultural industries, the number also decreased between 2017 and 2019, while employment in other industries rose by 2.4%.
Looking at 4-digit NACE rev. 2 industries, the decrease between 2019 and 2020 was most in 59.20 Sound recording and music publishing activities, 33%. Then in 60.10 Radio broadcasting (27.3%) and 59.14 Motion picture projection activities (26.4%). The number rose in several industries, including production, post-production and distribution of motion pictures etc. (59.11, 59.12, 59.13); book publishing (58.11), publishing of computer games (58.21) and cultural education (85.52).
About the data
This data comes from both the Icelandic Labour Force Survey (IS-LFS) and the register-based employment (RBE). Cultural employment refers to the definitions of Eurostat.
In IS-LFS data there is a cross-tabulation of cultural occupations (ÍSTARF95) and cultural industries (ÍSAT08) which Eurostat categorises as ‘fully cultural’. Cultural employment thus refers to all occupations in cultural industries as well as cultural occupations in other industries.
As the RBE data does not include information on occupation classifications (ÍSTARF95), only industries are included and therefore only those employed in cultural industries counted.
1 When updating numbers for 2020 from the IS-LFS, the ÍSTARF95 categories categorised as cultural occupation by Eurostat were revised. Five ÍSTARF95 categories were found to be unrelated to culture and were therefore excluded from these statistics. These are 1229, 2359, 7424, 7431 and 7432. The updated numbers for cultural employment are therefore lower for earlier years than those published in 2019 and 2020.
2 In total, numbers for cultural employment from IS-LFS include all those who have a main and/or a second job within cultural occupations or cultural industries. Each individual is counted only once, even if they are both self-employed and employees in culture. If a person has a second job within culture, but a main job in other, they are included under cultural employment but not other.