Expenditure on artistic, cultural and creative activity by governments in Australia in 2007–08 to 2020–21

The latest report from arts and culture sector think tank A New Approach expands on their Big Picture series to explore arts and culture expenditure by governments in Australia between the years of 2007–08 and 2020–21. The research draws on a new release of Australia’s most comprehensive dataset on this topic, the cultural funding by governments series (CFG). Australia is still spending less as a share of GDP on recreation, culture and religion compared to most of its OECD peers, ranking 23rd of 31 OECD countries in 2020 in this internationally comparable area of government spending. The report notes that this evidence raises further questions rather than clear answers, including about the global role of governments in stimulating and underpinning arts and culture alongside other sources of direct and indirect investment.
Read and download the executive summary or full report