Arts majors as entrepreneurs and innovators

This study examines the role of college graduates with degrees in the arts, STEM, and other creative fields as entrepreneurs and innovators in the US economy. As creativity is a trait of art students and is important for those acting as entrepreneurs and innovators in an economy, arts majors have the potential to play an important role in these areas. Using American Community Survey data, we look to identify arts, STEM, and other creative majors who are working in entrepreneurial occupations, those where self-employment is common, and innovative industries, those that are copyright intensive. As it is possible that the nature of arts occupations may be inherently more entrepreneurial and innovative, we compare arts majors to STEM and other creative majors also likely to work in such occupations. Using logistic regression, we find that majoring in a core arts field more than doubles an individual’s likelihood of working in an entrepreneurial occupation or an innovative industry relative to non-creative majors. Other creative majors, like communications and STEM majors, are also associated with an increased likelihood of working as entrepreneurs or innovators. Relative to STEM and other creative majors, majoring in a core arts field is associated with the greatest increase in the likelihood of working in an entrepreneurial occupation and third greatest increase in the likelihood of working in an innovative industry. While arts graduates play an important role in artistic creation, this paper highlights a role for these graduates as entrepreneurs and innovators in the US economy. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s11187-020-00416-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.