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(How) has your delivery of professional development / enteprise / employability modules changed due to Covid-19?

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"Cultural catastrophe” - over 400,000 creative jobs could be lost

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"Cultural catastrophe” - over 400,000 creative jobs could be lost

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"Cultural catastrophe" - over 400,000 creative jobs could be lost, with the UK creative industries projected to lose £1.4 billion a week in revenue in 2020.

New research from Oxford Economics projects a combined revenue drop of £74 billion for the UK's creative industries in 2020 (£1.4 billion a week), with a GVA drop of £29 billion.

406,000 (1 in 5) creative jobs expected to be lost - more than nine times the entire workforce of British Airways or almost triple the workforce of Asda in the UK.

Impact to be felt in all parts of the UK, with creative industries projected to be hit twice as hard as the wider economy overall and up to three times as hard regionally.

The Creative Industries Federation has today warned of a "cultural catastrophe" as newly commissioned research from Oxford Economics reveals that the UK's creative industries are on the brink of devastation. The UK's creative sector was previously growing at five times the rate of the wider economy, employing over 2 million people and contributing £111.7 billion to the economy - more than the automotive, aerospace, life sciences and oil and gas industries combined.

The new report, The Projected Economic Impact of Covid-19 on the UK Creative Industries, projects that the creative sector will be hit twice as hard as the wider economy in 2020, with a projected GVA shortfall of £29 billion. Many creative sub sectors are expected to lose more than half their revenue and over half of their workforce. Despite the Job Retention Scheme, the report projects that 119,000 permanent creative workers will be made redundant by the end of the year. The impact on employment is set to be felt twice as hard by creative freelancers with 287,000 freelance roles expected to be terminated by the end of 2020.

Regionally, London is projected to experience the highest drop in creative industries GVA, seeing a £14.6 billion (25%) shortfall. However, Scotland and the North East are expected to be hit hardest relatively, with projected GVA decreases of 39% (£1.7 billion) and 37% (£400 million) respectively. 1 in 6 (109,800) creative jobs could be lost in the capital, with the West Midlands expected to be most impacted in relative terms, with 2 in 5 creative jobs in the region projected to be lost. The North West and South West will also be hit hard, with both projected to lose around a third of creative jobs. This could represent a major setback to the levelling up agenda, particularly in light of research from Cambridge Econometrics, released by the PEC/Creative England this week, which suggests that, based on recovery from the 2008 recession, creative industries outside of London may take much longer to 'bounce back' than those in the capital.

Creative industries GVA projected to fall by £29 billion (-25%), with the creative industries being hit twice as hard as the wider UK economy* (*OBR estimate for UK GDP growth this year is -12.8%.)

Creative industries projected to lose 406,000 jobs and £74 billion in revenue (-30%).

Music, performing and visual arts projected to lose £11 billion in revenue (-54%) and 57% of jobs (178,000) with theatres, recording studios and concert venues remaining closed.

The music industry is projected to lose at least £3 billion in GVA (50%) and 60% of jobs (114,000), with the sector being hit hard by the collapse in live music and touring.

Theatre projected to lose £3 billion in revenue (61%) and 26% of permanent jobs (12,000), although this estimate only takes into account current cancellations and does not account for the reluctance of audiences to return to venues (only 20% would return on opening night according to a survey by Indigo). Further research from UK Theatre/SOLT shows that, without further intervention, job losses in theatre across permanent and freelance roles is likely to number over 200,000 (over 70%).

Film, TV, video, radio and photography could lose £36 billion in revenue (-57%), with the sector projected to lose 42% of jobs (102,000) as social distancing constraints affect cinema capacity and the cost of filmmaking. (* The BFI reported last month that 65% of film and high-end TV production had to be put on hold during the shutdown, although film and television production is now restarting following the introduction of extensive social distancing guidance.)

Postproduction and VFX could lose £827 million in revenue (-58%).

Radio projected to lose £186 million in revenue (-21%) as it sees a decline in advertising.

Crafts could lose £513 million in revenue (53%), with the craft economy projecting to lose 47% of jobs (58,000) as many craft practitioners experience the fallout of closed workshops and retail spaces.

Design and designer fashion within creative industries could lose £2 billion in revenue (-58%) and 30% of jobs (51,000). When we look at the reach of design across the economy, the risk is far greater, with a potential GVA drop of £37 billion (-47%) and over 300,000 jobs projecting to be lost.

Advertising and market research could see their turnover drop by £19 billion (-44%) projecting job losses of 26% (49,000), with spend on advertising expected to drop by £4 billion in 2020 (-17%).

Publishing could lose £7 billion in revenue (-40%) and 26% of jobs (51,000), affected by the closure of bookshops and decline of print sales.

Museums and galleries could lose £743 million in revenue (-9%) and 5% of jobs (4,000), with the impact being mitigated by being able to reopen in July under social distancing constraints.

Architecture projected to lose £1 billion in revenue (-24%) and 2% of jobs (1,800 jobs).

Regional breakdown:

London is projected to lose 16% of its creative jobs (109,800) and see a 25% (£14.6 billion) drop in creative industries GVA whilst the South East is projected to lose 24% of its creative jobs (82,000) and see a 25% (£4.7 billion) drop in creative industries GVA. Of the 406,000 creative jobs expected to be lost, 47% are projected to be in London and the South East.

The East of England is projected to lose 25% of its creative jobs (42,000) and see a 31% drop (£1.9 billion) in creative industries GVA.

Scotland is projected to see the largest percentage drop in creative industries GVA (39% / £1.7 billion) and lose 6% of its creative jobs (7,000), owing to a greater use of the furloughing scheme. However, the region is projected to be amongst the hardest hit once the Job Retention Scheme is withdrawn.

The North West is projected to lose 30% of its creative jobs (48,000) and see a 30% (£1.4 billion) drop in creative industries GVA .

The West Midlands is projected to be hit hardest in terms of job losses, with 43% of creative jobs projected to be lost (51,000) and a creative industries GVA shortfall of 32% (£1.4 billion).

The South West is projected to lose 28% of its creative jobs (43,000) and see a 29% (£1.3 billion) drop in creative industries GVA.

The East Midlands is projected to lose 1% of its creative jobs (1,300) but see a 31% (£800 million) drop in creative industries GVA, owing to a greater use of the furloughing scheme. However, the region is projected to be amongst the hardest hit once the Job Retention Scheme is withdrawn.

The North East is projected to lose 3% of its creative jobs (2,000) but see a 37% (£400 million) drop in creative industries GVA, owing again to a greater use of the furloughing scheme. However, like the East Midlands, the region is projected to be hit harder once the Job Retention Scheme is withdrawn.

Northern Ireland is projected to lose 20% (6,000) of its creative jobs and see a 23% (£300 million) drop in creative industries GVA.

Wales is projected to lose 26% (15,000) of its creative jobs and see a 10% (£100 million) drop in creative industries GVA .

Yorkshire is projected to see a 3% (£100 million) drop in creative industries GVA.

The report, released today, follows the Creative Industries Federation's open letter to government in April calling for urgent funding for the creative sector, which was signed by over 500 leading figures from the creative industries and beyond. In May, the Creative Industries Federation joined forces with UKHospitality and the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions to call for an extension of the Job Retention Scheme and Self Employed Income Support Scheme, as well as the introduction of targeted grant support for those sectors who will be last to return to work.

The Oxford Economics report, The Projected Economic Impact of Covid-19 on the UK Creative Industries, was commissioned by the Creative Industries Federation, in collaboration with the Advertising Association, AIM, Animation UK, Arts Council England, AudioUK, Bectu, BPI, British Fashion Council, BFI, Crafts Council, Design Council, Directors UK, Equity, Greater London Authority, GC Business Growth Hub, Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, Museums Association, Musicians Union, The Network of European Museum Organisations, Publishers Association and PPA, Radiocentre, RIBA, SOLT/UK Theatre, Ukie, UK Music, UK Screen Alliance, Welsh Government and West Midlands Combined Authority.

The analysis draws from responses to the Creative Industries Federation's survey of over 2,000 creative organisations and freelancers on the projected impact of the coronavirus pandemic on creative industries' employment, income and freelance contracts (Coronavirus Creative Industries Impact Survey, Creative Industries Federation, March-April, 2020). These responses were complemented with Oxford Economics' industry forecast to make assumptions on the quarterly profile of these developments. Where possible, data from individual trade bodies was employed to further inform these estimates. The results are based on the assumption that the Job Retention Scheme (furloughing) will be employed for as long as it is in place.

Caroline Norbury MBE, CEO, Creative Industries Federation, said: "With the economic impact of Covid-19 hitting hard, the role of our creative industries has never been more critical. As well as being a huge driver of economic growth in every part of the UK, our creative and cultural sectors bring communities together, they employ millions and are at the heart of our soft power. These are the industries of the future: highly innovative, resistant to automation and integral to both our cultural identity and the nation's mental health. We're about to need them more than ever.

Our creative industries have been one of the UK's biggest success stories but what today's report makes clear is that, without additional government support, we are heading for a cultural catastrophe. If nothing is done, thousands of world-leading creative businesses are set to close their doors, hundreds of thousands of jobs will be lost and billions will be lost to our economy. The repercussions would have a devastating and irreversible effect on our country.

We urgently need a Cultural Renewal Fund for those in the creative sector who will be hit hardest, including those industries who will be latest to return to work, those businesses unable to operate fully whilst maintaining social distancing and those creative professionals who continue to fall through the gaps of government support measures. We must also avoid a cliff-edge on vital measures such as the Job Retention Scheme and the Self Employed Income Support Scheme, which have been a financial lifeline for many parts of the creative industries and cannot be cut off overnight.

It is time to both imagine and engineer our future. We will need our creative industries to do that. They are too important to ignore."

Tim Marlow, Chief Executive, Design Museum, said: "Design will play an important role in responding to and recovering from the current crisis, but this report shows the huge impact that this pandemic will have on the future of the design and creative industries at a time when they are most needed. Like other cultural organisations, the Design Museum has found new ways to connect digitally with audiences at home during isolation, helping to bring creative communities together online. Without additional government support, however, we will see irreparable changes to the broader cultural landscape leading to a critical loss of jobs and the closure of vital institutions."

Shona McCarthy, Chief Executive, Fringe Society, said: "The Edinburgh Fringe not taking place for the first time in 73 years will have a profound impact on the 31,000 artists, 323 venues, myriad local businesses and employees who make the festival happen every August. Whilst the social and cultural loss is almost incalculable, the Fringe is directly responsible for nearly 3,000 jobs and contributes around £173m a year to the Scottish economy. We estimate the direct financial hit to Fringe venues and companies to be at least £21 million, with many of these individuals and organisations receiving little or no public subsidy. The Fringe has long been a global arts market for all of the UK, and a melting pot for great work to be made, showcased and picked up for touring all over the world, and that's why (alongside our partners in the Creative Industries Federation) we are calling on UK Government to take immediate action to safeguard one of our most important industries."

Julian Bird, Chief Executive, UK Theatre and Society of London Theatre (SOLT), said: "The UK's theatre industry plays a key economic, social and place-making role. Theatre and the performing arts make a powerful contribution to our society and to our diverse national identity. They make areas richer culturally and financially, and they make places more attractive to live and work. UK Theatre is a global success with our productions filling cultural venues from Broadway to Beijing. However, the impact of COVID-19 on the theatre industry has been immediate and devastating; with every UK venue now closed. COVID-19 has removed the sector's trading income entirely at a stroke and thrown its business model into crisis. In order to rescue the performing arts sector, we call on government to: sustain the workforce; catalyse the recovery; and review insurance and liability policies to ensure this valuable asset is protected and enhanced for the future. We hope this report goes some way to helping this happen."

Belinda Budge, Vice-Chair, Creative England and Creative Industries Federation, said: "The UK's creative sector brings joy to millions, plays a key role in maintaining the nation's mental health and is also a huge driver of economic growth. However, the report today projects a catastrophe for our creative ecosystem, with sectors projected to lose around half of their revenue. Publishing could lose £7 billion in revenue (-40%) and 26% of jobs (51,000), affected by the closure of bookshops and decline of print sales. As we emerge from lockdown, we will need imagination and creativity more than ever. We will need those who can take specks of ideas and carve them into a vision for the future. But for that, we need our creative industries."

Philippa Childs, Head of Bectu, said: "As the union for media and entertainment workers and freelancers the scale of devastation demonstrated in these figures is terrifying. People in the creative industries were some of the first to stop working and will be some of the last to return to work because of coronavirus. On top of that many of our members have fallen through the gaps of the government income support schemes and have already endured many months with no income coming in. The creativity that fuels this outstanding sector of the economy comes from people who have dedicated themselves to the film, theatre, TV, cinema and live events industries. They are the backbone of the success of this sector and any plans to implement a Cultural Renewal Fund must ensure that they are provided for."

Rosy Greenlees, Executive Director, Crafts Council, said: "The crafts are an important part of our social and economic life with the Crafts Council Market for Craft report launched last month showing craft sales worth £3 billion to the UK economy. However it is a sector dominated by micro enterprises and sole practitioners. The impact of covid-19 has cut off access to workshops and studios, blocked supplies and sales, shut down fairs and galleries but most importantly left craft businesses without an income. Whilst we welcome the government's measures, like other freelancers, many are unable to access this support. Going forward we will need business incentive schemes that reach out to these micro enterprises if we are to get the creative industries working again."

Andy Harrower, CEO, Directors UK, said: "It is vital that the Government offers meaningful support to the creative sector at this critical time. The films and television programmes directed by our members have kept the country entertained, informed and connected during lockdown. The majority of screen directors are freelancers and lost almost all of their work as the production industry ground to a halt. Many were unsupported due to gaps in the financial support available and a full return to work is likely to be slow and challenging as production adapts to safe working. UK television alone creates £3billion of revenue and £1.4billion in exports. Government intervention is needed now to support the industry and its workforce in getting back to work, and maintaining the UK's global position as a centre of excellence for film and television production and creative talent."

Neil Hatton, CEO, UK Screen Alliance, said: "Filming stopped in mid-February when Covid stuck, but Visual Effects and Post-Production continued to operate on work already in their pipelines. However, with no new work coming in, their hiatus will be delayed but will be just as deep and last for longer. The sudden and unexpected closure of the CJRS to previously unfurloughed employees from June 10th will be a critical blow to many companies whose hiatus is still to come. Rather than enabling flexible furlough, the new CJRS withdraws support just when it is needed."

Tom Kiehl, Acting CEO, UK Music, said: "Year after year the UK music industry is a proven winner for our economy, job creation and exports, as well as positively impacting other sectors like tourism. Coronavirus has turned our world upside down, with catastrophic consequences across the industry and beyond. The music industry is resilient, but this means knowing when to ask for help. We need help to restart our economy, help to preserve jobs and help to maintain the UK's fundamental position as a net exporter of music across the rest of the world."

Owen Meredith, Managing Director, Professional Publishers Association, said: "This report highlights the massive impact this crisis is having across the publishing industry. Demand for our editorial content is higher than ever before, with readers hungry for trusted sources of news, information and entertainment. Yet with a massive decline in the advertising market, and significant challenges on the newsstand, many much loved brands are at risk. Magazine media can play an important role in rebuilding economic confidence and communicating COVID guidance to businesses and consumers alike, the government should use our channel to support their communications as we work to rebuild together."

Ben Roberts, Chief Executive, BFI said: "Film and cinema stand shoulder to shoulder with our creative counterparts; we are all vital to the cultural fabric of our lives and our well-being, which we need more than ever. Our creative industries are huge contributors to the UK economy bringing in billions in international investment and providing thousands of jobs across the UK. Film and television production are now restarting and cinemas are hoping to reopen next month. However, there are still huge risks for independent filmmakers and for cinemas trying to make it through recovery and we are committed to supporting them through the ongoing challenges."

Sarah Weir, CEO, Design Council, said: "This report makes clear the potentially devastating impact of Coronavirus on the creative industries. This loss is replicated for the design economy - whose reach extends well beyond the creative sector into every part of the economy, potentially risking £37 billion in GVA. The job losses and financial cost identified here are severe enough to warrant urgent action from government. Designers and design businesses will be at the forefront of our national and global response and recovery from this pandemic. They will be providing innovation and people-centred solutions from rethinking the way private offices and public buildings function to the health, environmental and education services we need and the products that must become more sustainable and less impactful on our world. As we look forward to our social and economic recovery we need to keep design at the heart of our economy, and any reduction in the size of the design economy would have long-term negative consequences for UK skills, innovation, R&D, jobs, and the society we can build through collaboration and inclusivity. Government intervention must be maintained throughout this period of crisis and until we have fully emerged from the downturn."

Stephen Woodford, Chief Executive, Advertising Association, said: "We are working closely with Government to protect and rebuild the UK's advertising industry, both within the UK as a vital engine of our economy, but also as a global hub with international trading partners. Top of the list is how a tax credit for advertising could help get the UK economy rapidly firing on all cylinders again. We also need to see the most ambitious international marketing campaign possible from Government for our creative industries, particularly with Brexit looming. We are ready to make all of this happen fast and with real impact."

Alan Vallance, CEO, Royal Institute of British Architects said: "Architecture is a major contributor to the UK economy, but like other creative sectors, the RIBA and our members are extremely concerned about the future, with predictions for future work at an all-time low. Architects, working with others within the creative industries have a vital role to play in re-energising the economy and building and strengthening communities. We need the Government to invest in a green economic recovery, for the sector and the country."

Justine Simons OBE, Deputy Mayor for Culture and the Creative Industries, said: "Covid-19 has been devastating for the creative industries and this data starkly lays out the existential challenges they are facing. Culture is in London's DNA and it boosts our economy by £58 billion each year, but the countless closures and cancellations have put hundreds of thousands of jobs at risk.

"We are doing everything we can with our Culture at Risk Business Support Fund to help venues and artists across the capital and the Pay It Forward scheme is allowing Londoners to help businesses by buying goods and services in advance. It is essential the Government steps up, as other governments have around the world, and provides the comprehensive support urgently needed to allow these vital industries to play their part in driving our economy forward."

Richard Jeffery, Director of Business Growth, GC Business Growth Hub, said: "Greater Manchester region boasts one of the country's leading creative forces and is a key contributor to the estimated gross value added (GVA) revenue to the UK economy from UK culture and creative industries, which was projected to have reached £122bn, prior to the impact of COVID-19. This report shows the significant impact on trading, business revenue and employment as a result of COVID-19 on the rich talent that makes up the sector. The GC Business Growth Hub in Greater Manchester has continued to be #HereForBusiness throughout the current pandemic and has adapted and developed its services, engagements and delivery to continue to help the creative sector meet the ever changing challenges they face. In addition to our flagship sector programmes such as Creative Scale Up and Greater Connected, we also now have our EnterprisingYou programme for the self-employed. If you are in the wider creative sector and facing challenges, needing help including with business resilience and planning during these current and future challenging times, we are here for you; please do get in touch with our teams."

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You can download the full report here.

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Press release: "Cultural catastrophe" - over 400,000 creative jobs could be lost... The Projected Economic Impact of Covid-19 on the UK Creative Industries report. | Creative Industries Federation

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"Cultural catastrophe" - over 400,000 creative jobs could be lost, with the UK creative industries projected to lose £1.4 billion a week in revenue in 2020. New research from Oxford Economics projects a combined revenue drop of £74 billion for the UK's creative industries in 2020 (£1.4 billion a week), with a GVA drop of £29 billion.

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They call it commencement because it's supposed to be a new beginning.

College graduation is one of life's last clean transitions, a final passage from adolescence to adulthood that is predictable in ways other transitions rarely are. Relationships end with breakups or death, jobs often end with quitting or firing, but college is one of the only things in life that ends with a fresh start. Except when it doesn't.

One morning in March, Clavey Robertson took a study break and climbed onto the roof of his dorm at the University of California, Berkeley. He had spent the past year working on his senior thesis on the erosion of the social-safety net since the Great Depression, and he needed to clear his head. In the distance, Robertson could see a tiny white speck: the Diamond Princess cruise ship, carrying crew members infected with COVID-19, lingering in the San Francisco Bay.
Hannah Beier, a photography major in the Drexel University Class of 2020, has been virtually photographing her classmates in quarantine. She directed this series of portraits over FaceTime.
Two months later, Robertson's transition to adulthood is in limbo. He skipped his online commencement and he's living in his childhood bedroom, which had been converted to a guest room. His parents have lost their travel agency work, and his own job prospects have dried up. "No longer am I just a student writing about the Great Depression," he says. "Now there's a depression."

College graduation is often marked by an adjustment period, as students leave the comforts of campus to find their way in the raw wilderness of the job market. But this year's graduates are staggering into a world that is in some ways unrecognizable. More than 90,000 Americans have died; tens of millions are out of work; entire industries have crumbled. The virus and the economic shock waves it unleashed have hammered Americans of all ages. But graduating in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic will have enduring implications on the Class of 2020: for their memories, their earning power, and their view of what it means to have a functional society. For these young adults, the pandemic represents not just a national crisis but also a defining moment.

Even before COVID-19, the Class of 2020 came of age at a time of fear and uncertainty. Born largely in 1997 and 1998-among the oldest of Gen Z-the Class of 2020 were in day care and pre-kindergarten on 9/11. Their childhoods have been punctuated by school -shootings and catastrophic climate change. Their freshman year at college began with President Donald Trump's election; their senior year ended with a paralyzing global health crisis. "We stepped into the world as it was starting to fall apart," says Simone Williams, who graduated from Florida A&M University in an online commencement May 9. "It's caused my generation to have a vastly different perspective than the people just a few years ahead of us or behind us."

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Researchers have found that the major events voters experience in early adulthood--roughly between the ages of 14 and 24-tend to define their political attitudes for the rest of their lives. And the Class of 2020's generation was -already disaffected. Only 8% of -Americans -between 18 and 29 believe the government is working as it should be, and fewer than 1 in 5 consider themselves "very patriotic," according to the 2020 Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics survey of young Americans. They are at once widely skeptical of U.S. institutions and insistent on more government solutions; they're disappointed in the current system, but hold out hope for a better one.

For the Class of 2020, COVID-19's lasting impact may be determined by what happens next. If the rising cohort of young workers are left to fend for themselves, mass youth unemployment could lead to permanent disillusionment or widespread despair. A forceful, effective response that invests in the rising generation of American talent could restore their faith in the system.

It's not clear to the Class of 2020 how the pandemic will play out. They just know it will change their lives. "Everything" is at stake, says Yale history major Adrian Rivera. "It's this pivotal moment where we'll never forget what's done," he says. "Or what isn't done."

School is often a refuge from the gusts of history. But the events that rupture the classroom routine, from President Kennedy's assassination to 9/11, tend to be the ones that stick with students forever.

The coronavirus disrupted more class time, for more students, than almost any other event in U.S. history. It started with a scramble: The University of Washington announced on March 6 that it was cancelling in-person classes for its 57,000 students. Then Stanford University followed suit. Over the next few days, campuses from Harvard to the University of Michigan announced they'd be transitioning to online learning. Soon, hundreds of other colleges and universities followed.

By Friday, March 13, an eerie silence fell on campuses across the nation. "Something about that day was really weird, because every time my friends and I would say 'See you later' or 'Catch you after break,' I just had this sinking feeling that I wasn't going to see them," says Vincent Valeriano, a member of Iowa State University's Class of 2020. "Saying goodbye felt like it carried a lot more weight than it used to." He ended up watching his online -graduation -ceremony at home, in his pajamas.

For underclassmen, the shortened semester was an irritating disruption. For seniors, it was a total upheaval. "There's no way for there to be closure," says Sam Nelson, who recently graduated with a journalism degree from the University of Missouri. "I know in real life, closure doesn't exist, but this is one of the last moments for young people to say goodbye to young adulthood and move into the next phase of their lives."

The Class of 2020 hugged their closest friends and mourned their lost semester, but scattered back home without so much as a goodbye to many people they'd lived with for years. Acquaintances who laughed in hallways or shared inside jokes in seminars simply disappeared. Fraternities and sororities canceled their formals and philanthropy events, attempting Zoom happy hours that didn't come close to the real thing. For some couples, casual hookups quickly escalated into long-distance relationships. Others quietly packed up their feelings for college crushes and left without saying a word.

The loss of a milestone like an in-person commencement had a special sting for some families. Arianny Pujols, the first natural-born U.S. citizen in her family and the first to graduate from college, still did her hair and makeup as if she were walking across the stage at Missouri State University. She and her family held a small ceremony in her grandfather's backyard, and then she stood on the sidewalk in her cap and gown waving at cars with a sign that said "Honk, I did it!" Brenda Sanchez, 22, whose parents are immigrants from Mexico, says they will miss both her graduation from Humboldt State University in California and her sister's college graduation the next day. "My parents didn't go to school. They didn't graduate," says Sanchez, who is herself an immigrant and is protected from deportation by President Obama's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy. "Your heart breaks a little. You did work hard, you did earn this degree, but you're not going to see yourself walk across that stage."

Instead of graduating into their future lives, many Class of 2020 seniors feel like they've gone backward. "We were ready to be in the world as young adults-not good adults, maybe clumsy adults, but some kind of adult," says Ilana Goldberg, who recently graduated from Tufts University in an online ceremony. "We're not in the system anymore, but we're not far enough out of it to have our footing in the world."

Eric Kolarik, who was supposed to be sitting at his University of Michigan commencement ceremony in early May, is instead back home in Traverse City, Mich., raking leaves, helping his mom with the dishes, doing the same chores he did in high school. "I'm 22 but I've assumed the life of 15-year-old Eric again," he says. "You feel like a failure to launch."

If only they knew that a stolen senior spring is the least of their problems. The Class of 2020 is falling through a massive hole in the U.S. social-safety net, into a financial downturn that could define their lives for decades to come.
Graduating seniors have lost on-campus jobs that got them through school. Many haven't been working for long enough to qualify for full unemployment. If they've been listed as dependents on their parents' taxes, they don't get a stimulus check. They haven't had time to build up significant savings.

"I'm not sure they've fully processed what 25% unemployment, disproportionately affecting younger Americans, will actually mean," says John Della Volpe, director of polling at Harvard's Institute of Politics. He recalls that during the last recession, the Class of 2009 scrambled to scoop up opportunities, "like a game of- -musical chairs." The Class of 2020, by contrast, is essentially frozen in place by a pandemic that has trapped much of the nation inside their homes. "There almost are no opportunities in any sector," Della Volpe says. "It's like suspended animation."

More than 1 in 5 employers surveyed by the National Association of Colleges and Employers in April said they were rescinding their summer internship offers. The overall number of postings on the online jobs platform ZipRecruiter have fallen by nearly half since mid-February, while new postings for entry-level positions have plummeted more than 75%, according to ZipRecruiter labor economist Julia Pollak. A year ago, less experienced job seekers were enjoying brisk wage growth and rosy job prospects. Now, Pollak says, "it's particularly hard for new graduates.

Sanchez, who worked two jobs and started her own eyelash-extension business to help pay for school, has applied for more than 70 jobs in recent weeks without success. Williams, who dreams of working in the entertainment industry, had no luck with at least 15 jobs and struck out with fellowships that are no longer taking applicants; now she's cobbling together gig work. Robertson had planned to try to get a job in labor activism; these days, he's considering graduate school instead.

It's not just dream jobs that have disappeared. Historically, many young people take positions in the retail or restaurant industries as they find their path. According to Pew, of the roughly 19 million 16-to-24-year-olds in the labor force, more than 9 million were employed in the service sector. Suddenly, a significant chunk of those jobs have evaporated. In April alone, the leisure and hospitality industry lost 47% of its total workforce, with 7.7 million workers newly unemployed, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Which means the economic crisis has hit the youngest harder than any other age group. More than half of Americans under 30 say someone in their household has lost a job or taken a pay cut because of the corona-virus crisis, according to Pew, and the youngest workers are more likely than older generations to say that the pandemic has hurt their finances more than other people.

Graduating into a bad economy can affect everything from future earnings to long-term health and happiness. Researchers have found that beginning a career in the teeth of a recession can depress earnings for 10 years, and trigger broader impacts for decades. One study from UCLA and Northwestern found that the young people who came of age -during the early 1980s recession had higher mortality, and were more likely to get divorced, and less likely to have children. Till von Wachter, a UCLA labor economist who has spent years studying this issue, has a name for these young people who enter the labor force at the worst possible moment: "unlucky graduates."

Rather than brave a job market battered by COVID-19, some in the Class of 2020 are seeking refuge in graduate school. But that presents its own conundrum. As of 2019, nearly 7 in 10 college students graduated with student loans, with an average tab of nearly $30,000. Going to graduate school can mean -taking on even more debt. "I'm having to take out grad loans, but I can't work to pay them off," says Sean Lange, who plans to enroll in a master's program in public policy after graduating from New York's Stony Brook University in an online ceremony in May. He's not even sure he'll get his money's worth for the $18,000 annual tuition. Especially if his classes end up being taught online.

All of this-the forgone memories, the abrupt goodbyes, the lost opportunities-will stay with the Class of 2020 forever. "The coronavirus pandemic is the biggest cultural event since World War II," says Jean Twenge, a psychologist and author of iGen, who studies millennials and Gen Z. "It's going to have a huge impact on -everyone, but young adults in particular."

Even before COVID-19, much of Gen Z was disappointed in the government response to the issues facing their generation. These are the students who joined the March for Our Lives gun-safety movement amid near weekly school shootings, and went on strike over inaction on climate change. They were too young to be swept up in Barack Obama's 2008 campaign, but old enough to gravitate toward Bernie Sanders' message of progressive revolution in the 2016 primary. Those who were old enough to vote overwhelmingly opposed President Trump in that year's general election. They favor student debt reform and universal health care. They are the most -racially diverse generation in U.S. history.

Their skepticism of public institutions is largely fueled by a sense that the government is doing too little, not too much. A study last year by Pew Research Center found that 7 in 10 wanted the government to "do more to solve problems." The divide is generational, not political: more than half of Gen Z Republicans say they want the government to do more. (Less than a third of older Republicans agree.)

Near mandatory use of social media has already contributed to sky-high levels of depression and anxiety among Gen Z, according to Twenge. She analyzed data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health and found that the number of young adults reporting symptoms of major depression had increased 63% between 2009 and 2017, with a marked turning point around 2012, when smartphone use first became widespread. The pandemic has likely only made them more anxious and disillusioned. Pew found that Americans between 18 and 29 are more likely than older ones to feel depressed during the pandemic, and less hopeful about the future than the senior citizens who are far more vulnerable to the disease caused by the virus.

Which helps explain why young activists view this as a now-or-never moment for their cohort. They know that the pandemic will shape their futures, even if it's not yet clear exactly how. "Either we will end up with a generation that is far more resilient than earlier generations," says Varshini Prakash, a leader of the Gen Z-powered Sunrise Movement, "or it could be a generation that is far more nihilistic, and far less likely to engage in our politics because they've seen the institutions fail them at the times they really needed it." The youngest cohort of Americans "could be traumatized for life," says Robert Reich, a former U.S. Labor Secretary who is now a professor of public policy at University of California, Berkeley. "They could turn economically and socially inward. They could lose faith in all institutions, and they are trending in that direction anyway."

In other countries, like Egypt, Tunisia and Spain, widespread unemployment among educated young people has led to social unrest or radicalization, mostly because of a sense of betrayal. They think, "we thought there was some kind of bargain, a social contract, that if we play by the rules we get a job at the end of all of this," says Heath Prince, a research scientist at University of Texas at Austin. So far youth unemployment in the U.S. is mostly correlated with drug addiction and right-wing extremism, Prince says, and hasn't tipped into the realm of mass uprisings. Then again, -unemployment hasn't been this high in nearly 80 years.

"My generation isn't feeling like they're being spoken to or listened to, and at the same time, a lot of us are becoming economically disenfranchised," says Robertson, the University of California, Berkeley, graduate who studied the New Deal. "I definitely think a lot of us have lost confidence in the government."

The only way to address an unemployment rate reminiscent of the 1930s, according to some scholars, students and activists, is a federal government response that echoes the scale of 1930s reforms. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal included major initiatives to get young Americans back to work. Six days after he took office in 1933, Roosevelt proposed the Civilian Conservation Corps: within four months, the federal government had hired 300,000 young men to plant trees and maintain parks and trails. Three million young people were ultimately employed as part of the program. In 1935, Roosevelt created the National Youth Administration (NYA) as part of the Works Progress Administration, designed to give young Americans work-study and job training. (A young Lyndon B. Johnson got an early political break as an administrator of the NYA program in Texas.) The Americans employed by these New Deal programs grew into the selfless, patriotic army that fought World War II, now known as the "Greatest Generation."

Some Democrats say the COVID-19 pandemic calls for a similar approach. Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts has called for a "Coronavirus Containment Corps," to expand the public-health workforce and employ an army of contact-tracers to help fight the spread of the virus. (Warren, an admirer of the New Deal, noted the CCC acronym is no coincidence.) Senator Chris Coons (D., Del.) joined with Senator Bill Cassidy (R., La.) to champion a national service bill that would expand Americorps and fund 750,000 jobs to help train new health care workers to fight COVID-19. And proponents of a Green New Deal, like Prakash and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, are working to shape the environmental policy of presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.

Given Republicans' skepticism of big government programs, none of these ideas are likely to make it through Mitch McConnell's Senate or onto President Trump's desk. But the political landscape has already shifted the universe of the possible, with Republicans agreeing to recovery measures-such as sending $1,200 stimulus checks to eligible working Americans-that would have been unthinkable only months ago. And if Democrats reclaim the Senate and the White House, broader reform could be closer than it looks. Young people who are skeptical of government's ability to solve big problems say their faith can be restored. "I have no faith in this Administration and this government," explains Lange, the Stony Brook public-policy student. "But I believe in Big Government."

Eric Kolarik spent his last semester at the University of Michigan working on a paper about the 1918 flu pandemic. Now, with classes canceled and his job search on ice, his copy of The Great Influenza is on his childhood bookshelf, alongside his old high school copies of The Crucible and Of Mice and Men. "There will be a sort of unity that the Class of 2020 has with each other, and it's not fond memories," he says. "People will say, 'You're the Class of 2020,' and everyone will know what that meant."

The pandemic has marked the end of one phase for this unlucky cohort. The recovery could mark the beginning of another.
Cover photograph in collaboration with Melissa Nesta
Write to Charlotte Alter at charlotte.alter@time.com.

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How COVID-19 Will Shape the Class of 2020 For the Rest of Their Lives

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They call it commencement because it's supposed to be a new beginning. College graduation is one of life's last clean transitions, a final passage from adolescence to adulthood that is predictable in ways other transitions rarely are.

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What networking opportunities are provided as alternative to e.g. a degree show?

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What networking opportunities are provided as alternative to e.g. a degree show?

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Does your institution offer students (free) digital training?

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Does your institution offer students (free) digital training?

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Listing site for visual artists

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Artquest Exchange

Artquest Exchange is our free, professional, peer to peer online community for visual artists. Use it to find artists around the corner or around the world to:

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Artquest - visual artists development, opportunities, research

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Supporting visual artists at all stages of their careers through free access to information, opportunities, and resources. Research into artists' livelihoods.

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Creative and cultural work without filters: Covid-19 and exposed precarity in the creative economy

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Creative and cultural work without filters: Covid-19 and exposed precarity in the creative economy

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ABSTRACT
The precarious nature of creative and cultural work is widely acknowledged in academic literature. However, it has often been invisible in the eyes of policy and policymaking. As soon as the spread of Covid-19 started impacting local and national economies across the globe, many industry and policy bodies rushed into researching the impact of Covid-19 on the creative and cultural industries (CCIs) and the workers in the sector. The paper offers an insight into the key concerns of these organizations through the meta-analysis of the survey and research projects that are currently being undertaken in the context of the UK. The results highlight common concerns in relation to visible and invisible issues that need addressing in the sector. The paper concludes by questioning if Covid-19 represents a moment of crisis for the sector or has simply exposed the unsustainable price of creative and cultural work.

Introduction

The precarious livelihoods and working conditions of creative and cultural workers (CCW) are widely acknowledged in academic literature (de Peuter, Morgan & Nelligan, ;). However, this has often been invisible in the eyes of UK policy and policymaking. Comunian and Conor () have highlighted how this precarity seems to become visible only in moments of crisis. One such moment is the current spread of Covid-19 globally. The pandemic has immediate health and national security impacts but is forecasted to have more long-lasting effects on local and national economies across the globe (Baldwin & Tomiura, ). In this article, we focus specifically on the United Kingdom (UK) and the impact - or rather exposure - that Covid-19 has given to the vulnerability of the creative and cultural industries (CCIs) and their workers. At this specific moment in time - April 2020 - with official records of deaths and affected populations in the UK beginning the first of March 2020, we acknowledge the way the CCIs sector - both before and after the introduction of restrictive measures (lockdown) and enforced closure of cultural venues - has become subject of numerous surveys and studies. From the 12th March, when the first survey was launched by trade union BECTU, we have been able to identify 22 live or completed surveys addressed to the CCIs sector (and specific sub-sectors) targeting a range of issues and trying to forecast the impact of Covid-19. In this paper, we are interested in critically acknowledging this rush for data and the pressure on mapping and understanding the impact of Covid-19 from a range of public, not-for-profit and other types of sectoral institutions. We are also specifically interested in what is (and what is not) being researched and how the questions posed (and early findings) connect with previous knowledge of the sector and the precarious nature of its workforce.

The paper is structured in three parts. Firstly, we summarize the literature under three headings: creative labour market dynamics, precarity and finally CCW in moments of crisis. In part two, we introduce our methodological perspective and consider the value of adopting a meta-analytical framework (Card, ) to reflect on the current knowledge sought (and found) in relation to CCW and Covid-19. Here we also justify the value of selecting the UK as a case study for the research. While acknowledging the limitation of this exploratory paper - building on data and surveys partially still in the making - the article offers early insights into the key concerns of UK research, industry and policy bodies that are being echoed internationally (UNESCO, ). The results distinguish between the immediate visible issues that are addressed by the surveys and reports and the more invisible ones which will potentially have more long-term impacts. The paper concludes by questioning in what ways Covid-19 represents a moment of crisis for CCW or merely has exposed its unsustainable nature. In conclusion, we propose that rather than a call for resilience, policy needs to connect with a rethinking of the future sustainable development of the sector (Wilson et al., ).

Understanding creative and cultural work: settings, downfalls and moments of crisis

The literature on CCW is extensive. It is also made more complicated by the fact that different disciplines and researchers adopt varied terminology to talk about work in specific sectors and who is included. Media studies and sociology academics often prefer to use the term creative labour (Smith & McKinlay, ), while others have preferred to use cultural work (Cohen, ). Lee () provides a valuable review of these contexts, terms and their evolution. Florida () added glamour and appeal to this area of work for policymakers forging the new term "creative class". However, his approach was heavily criticized for being fuzzy (Markusen et al., ), as well as for subjugating creativity to the new neoliberal urban imperative (Peck, ). In this paper, we take an inclusive stand and use the term CCW to bring together the different approaches mentioned above ¹. Working across a range of disciplines researching CCW, we propose to classify the current knowledge around three central cores. The first relates to the omnipresent - and almost unavoidable - characteristics of CCIs labour markets. The second, more recent, is connected with patterns of neoliberalism and precarization of work which have spread from CCW in the early 2000s to become staples of our current gig economy (Friedman, ). Finally, closely connected with the impact of the global financial crisis in 2008 we reflect on the new rhetoric that sees CCW (and CCIs) as being "resilient" (Beirne et al., ) or able to bounce back from periods of crisis (De Propris, ).

Creative and cultural work: a wide-angle view - The landscape of CCW and their specific labour markets have been studied for decades for their distinctive characteristics and presented as "exceptional" (Abbing, ). Caves () summarizes some of the principles under which the CCIs operate. Here we summarize the principles that have clear connections and implications for CCW. The "nobody knows principle" summarizes the uncertainty of demand and markets in CCIs, which has implications both for who manages these industries and who is employed in them. How risk and uncertainty are addressed (Seidel, ) connects strongly with working conditions and social securities. The next principle that Caves () highlights is that of "art for art's sake": "workers care about originality, technical professional skill, harmony, etc. of creative goods and are willing to settle for lower wages" (Caves, , p. 2). The passion and pleasure taken from work have strong implications for the ways CCW behave in the labour market and their freedom and autonomy to create (Hesmondhalgh & Baker, ). Concerning work, the "motley crew" (the need to combine a range of skills) and "time flies" (the temporary nature of CCIs projects) principles acknowledge the time-bound nature of work and innovation in CCIs (Caves, ). It highlights how each product is a complex interconnection of different skills and skilled individuals. This reveals aspects of collective endeavours behind each job/project (Becker, ) and the centrality of collaborative work. Furthermore, it also has implications for the potential of CCW to engage with collective (political) action (de Peuter, ). However, this multiplicity of skills and the complexity of project-work is instead discussed mainly in relation to the fragmentation and casualization of the jobs available within the sector (Merkel, Morgan et al., ;) and the need for CCW to have diverse skillsets (Ibert & Schmidt, ). Another structural condition that organizes skills and workers is the one of the "A list/B list"; "Artists are ranked on their skills, originality, and proficiency [...] Small differences in skills and talent may yield huge differences in (financial) success" (Caves, , p.2). However, these differential economic rewards have considerable implications in shaping the lives of many aspiring "B list" creatives, including young graduates (Comunian et al., ) who accept living on the breadline while hoping to enter the "A list".

Creative and cultural work: "without filters" - Many authors reflect on how CCW is problematically depicted in job descriptions or the media and films. They are presented as cool and young (Neff et al., ); their environments and offices are open, tolerant and egalitarian (Gill, ; Ross, ) and the "alternative" scenes or global cities make the perfect landscape to provide inspirations and boost creativity (Moore, ). However, when looking closely, these same researchers find that this image is very different from the reality of CCW, as if multiple filters have been used (like a glamourous Instagram image). The invisible nature of these filters and the limited attention given in the public domain to the reality of CCW (Comunian & Conor, ) seems to be integral to the promotion of the sector globally. Instead, CCW is exposed in the same literature cited above for its exclusionary nature under different and interconnected perspectives: economic, social and spatial. In relation to the discussion of the impact of Covid-19 the economic dimension is dominant in our review, but we of course acknowledge that any economic struggle has an impact on who in society can access resources (and in this case labour and careers) in relation to gender, ethnicity and social class as well as spatially where these CCW might be displaced (Catungal et al., ). Here we engage specifically with the growing literature on the precarious nature of CCW but also try and connect it with the impact of this precariousness on individuals and their livelihoods.

Creative and cultural work: "system image recovery" - Covid-19 represents a moment of global crisis - ongoing as we write this paper. Commonly in the literature on crisis and shocks the term "resilience" is used. Robinson () uses it specifically when studying responses of the arts and cultural sector to the 2008 global financial crisis and defines adaptive resilience as "the capacity to remain productive and true to core purpose and identity while absorbing disturbance and adapting with integrity in response to changing circumstances" (Robinson, , p. 14). The assumption is that the CCIs, with the right attitude and structure, can adapt to funding cuts. However, despite the positive connotations attached to the term by Arts Council England and policymakers, others have criticized the use of "resilience" as a policy buzzword. This was "one of the numerous linguistic devices deployed to make the naturalness of privatization and corresponding public disinvestment basic assumptions of policymaking" (Gupta & Gupta, , p. 14). Similarly, Pratt () questions the association between resilience and the cultural economy. He argues that the cultural sector was born "resilient" in that - even before the 2008 crisis - it follows different organizational dynamics (like the ones identified by Caves, ) that have shaped it to rely on flexible production networks and different labour structures. However, this resilience has many weaknesses and does not necessarily lead to exponential economic growth. In fact, "the social and economic costs of constant reinvention are high [...] the affective relationships that are generated via cultural labour encourage self-exploitation", and ultimately the resilience we might witness is in fact "outsourced to flexible or freelance workers who bear the costs and risks of uncertainty" (Pratt, , p. 136).

So, the resilient response of CCW in 2008 was to work in more precarious conditions than they did before. Self-employment, precarity, freelancing and even entrepreneurship are therefore read by the established neoliberal framework as resilient behaviours. As Ibert and Schmidt (, p. 20) further articulate, resilience is translated to individual "adaption and adaptability", supporting the development of "telescopic identities" and "prismatic identities" that allow CCW to manage unpredictable circumstances, playing with new skills or mobility to make a living. However, the real account of what this resilience and adaptability means for individuals in the CCIs is less positive than policy would like to believe. Beirne et al. () identify the struggles and personal costs of resilience:

[...] These artists and communities were surviving rather than prospering. They were passionately frustrated rather than assuredly transformative, resigned to exploiting gaps and opportunities, with a resilience that was often difficult to sustain and which took them on an emotional roller coaster (Beirne et al., , p. 217)

Concluding this literature review, we can see that even before the Covid-19 crisis CCW, shaped by internal dynamics and the laws of its labour market but also extensive pressure from neoliberal and globalization forces, has experienced major shifts in the current century. Furthermore, the previous economic crisis (2008) has stretched the level of social insecurity and contractual standards offered, adding an instrumentalized resilience rhetoric that, rather than acknowledging the impact of this major event on the sector, has foisted greater risks and uncertainty on workers.

Methodology

Here we briefly explain our methodology, building on the definition of CCW provided ¹ and presenting the geographical focus of our analysis. We focused on the UK partly for practical reasons - time constrains and maintaining consistency in relevance to the geography and policy context we wanted to map and discuss. However, we suggest that the UK context potentially highlights broader dynamics associated with the neoliberal world of CCW that have spread globally (Beck, ). The UK represents an interesting context to investigate for many reasons. Firstly, the UK has been one of the early advocates of the economic value of the CCIs (DCMS, ) and promoting mapping of CCW (DCMS, ). Secondly, the UK has led in broader research on CCW - both from academic and policy organizations. Finally, strong emphasis after the global financial crisis in 2008 has been placed on the sector to "weather" economic crisis (De Propris, ) and even, as the then Prime Minister Gordon Brown stated, as a means to "pull Britain out of recession" (Tylee, ).

The paper represents a reflexive account on academic and policy-led research. As academics, the temptation is to rush into data collection when observing a phenomenon like the impact of Covid-19. However, when we started thinking about how we would collect data, we were not the only ones observing a rush to research and capture information from the field - Nesta had also compiled a list of relevant surveys (PEC, ). Therefore, instead of launching another survey, we decided to provide a reflective meta-analysis of the current research being promoted and undertaken in the UK. Our meta-analysis approach (Card, ) allowed us to take the existing surveys as our data. We draw inferences - based on the questions being asked (and how the findings were articulated) - about the information deemed important to acquire on the impact of Covid-19 (both on the content and wording of the research questions) and whether these are specific to certain groups of respondents or organizations. From this, we were also able to reflect on what was not being asked and how this might reveal long-term questions about the sustainability of the sector (Wilson et al., ). We, therefore, articulate our analysis under two main headings: visible critical issues and invisible structural concerns.

We tracked all active or concluded surveys that were promoted/ circulated in March. An analysis of the basic descriptive statistics of the surveys considered is presented in Table 1.

The sample includes twelve concluded surveys and ten which were still live at the time of data collection (1 st - 10 th April). For the concluded surveys, we also accessed any published results, mapping seven results reports or blogs. All surveys were launched between 12th and 31st March, with most (73%) launched prior to the announcement of the government's self-employment package (26th March) ². 55% of surveys were carried out by membership and industry/sector representative bodies. There were an even number (n=9) of surveys looking at organizational impact (business, industry, large organizations and employers) or individual impact (self-employed/freelancers/independents), with four surveys considering both groups. A higher proportion of surveys were sector-specific (68%) including music, media (film and TV), heritage and museums, performing and visual arts, fashion, and publishing industries, with the remaining 32% addressing the CCIs as a whole.

Findings & discussion

Visible critical issues - As expected, one of the main concerns of the surveys is the perceived impact of Covid-19 on the immediate changes in revenues and its short-term economic viability. Slightly more than half of them (60%) phrased this as a general enquiry into the anticipated or experienced impact of the crisis. Here we find both questions on the general impacts on individuals from a professional perspective (50%) or more general impacts on organizations (30%) and the likelihood (and duration) of survival overall (business/organization) or impact on survival and long-term viability (20%). For example, we find questions like "How many months at current levels of support can you pay staff?" (ICO, , question 5) or "If you are an organization, how long do you believe you can sustain your organization on your existing financial reserves?" (CIF, , question 3). 50% articulated this more as changes in activity (reduction or suspension/cancellation) - including programming, events, public-facing work and individual workloads. Furthermore, 60% of live surveys asked about financial impacts (including change or loss of income/revenue and predicted overall financial impact - monthly and annual). Of these, 40% asked about the loss of income/revenue due to closure/reducing activity (actual or estimated). Across the live and completed surveys, questions were also asked/data collected on ongoing outgoings for creative businesses and individuals (i.e. rent, business rates, leasing of equipment, etc.). Concluded surveys reported significant reductions in organizational activities and individual workloads, with some reporting a 100% loss of activity/work (CIF, ). This was particularly important for artists: "since the initial government guidance to social distance and self-isolate 82% of respondents have had upcoming work cancelled, including events, performances and public activities. Meanwhile, 59% of respondents have cancelled their own similar types of upcoming work." (a-n The Artists Information Company, , para. 4). This corresponded with reports of significant loss of income/revenue across organizations and individuals across all of the reports analysed (a-n The Artists Information Company, ; BECTU, ; CircusWorks, ; Crafts Council UK, ; Heritage Fund, ). While responding directly to the increased precarity caused by the Covid-19 crisis, awareness among CCWs of the precarious nature of CCW was acknowledged by BECTU (, para. 7): " theatre workers, many of whom work on casual contracts and zero-hours contracts, had already anticipated the measures the government introduced later in the week and were aware of the precarious situation they are in" . Concerns over the long-term viability/survival of organizations and individuals' ability to continue working in the CCIs were identified. It connected with a lack of financial reserves (Circus Works, ; Heritage Fund, ) building on the notorious distrust towards CCIs by traditional financial services (Monclus, ).

The second most visible aspect covered in both active and closed surveys relates to the support that CCIs and workers require in response to Covid-19. Many (80%) live surveys asked about support requirements (from the sector and government, including understanding, eligibility and effectiveness of support available). Furthermore, 40% asked people's perceptions of government support measures (at the time of the survey). 60% asked what support people (businesses and individuals) wanted (from the sector or the government). In some cases, there was concern over an individual's understanding of government support: "Do you understand the current government proposals to support workers' income as they apply to you?" (BECTU, ). In others, views on the effectiveness of support packages were collected - the Creative Cardiff survey asked "Is this Government scheme enough? Do you think the eligibility criteria of the scheme is fair? Will the scheme help you to cover your losses?" (Komorowski & Lewis, , question 8). The findings presented on this front in the concluded surveys identified issues concerning eligibility for government support measures in association with being self-employed, but also connected with business types (Limited Companies) or turnover (Komorowski & Lewis, ). Many of the organizations were using the surveys and data to lobby the government for support. These calls were echoed across sector reports, with little industry specification, with a focus on support for freelancers/self-employed (grants and interest-free loans, tax deferral, rent holidays), but also faster access to funding for CCIs and more general support including simplifying applications for Universal Credit (BECTU, ). This included calls for government and representative/funding bodies within the sector to establish emergency funding; for example to "Introduce a Creative Industries Distress Fund, established by DCMS, to rapidly respond to bids for support based on urgent needs that are unique to our sector"(CIF, , para. 5).

Even after further support measures were announced, many reports were pushing for greater clarity over the support available. They called for revisions to funding eligibility criteria to address the ineligibility of CCW and organizations. CIF () reported that although the government support measures (Business Interruption Loan) were welcome "early evidence suggests that these will not reach a large proportion of creative businesses and charities, many of whom have lost 100% of their income due to the fallout from Covid-19." (para.3). Komorowski and Lewis () also critique the allocation of financial support through the SEISS ⁵ based on profits: "Unlike PAYE employees, for freelancers' profits are the icing on the cake - most of their revenue is swallowed up by overheads and other expenses" (p.6). Furthermore, because the government support requires a record of tax returns (and for the freelancer to have been trading for the last financial year) a large number of newly self-employed individuals, including recent graduates, fall through the gaps; "With the rise of the 'gig economy', there are many new freelancers in the creative industries, most of whom are ineligible" (Komorowski & Lewis, , p. 6)

All the organizations involved have tried to act as a source of advice (on support initiatives, funding, adapting business/work and other coping mechanisms during the crisis). Most organizations linked to other (online) sources with guidance for their sector/CIs generally and other advice from creative and non-creative organizations, including government guidance.

Invisible personal and long-term sustainability - We noticed in all surveys a clear lack of attention towards demographic information. While this decision may have been related to regulations on collecting sensitive personal information (GDPR), it potentially reveals a disinterest in understanding whether Covid-19 might impact groups of CCWs differently - especially women, disabled or ethnic minorities. None of the live surveys analysed here asked for demographic information and no demographic differences have been reported from the completed surveys so far. Only one of the concluded surveys (a-n The Artists Information Company, , para. 7) acknowledged the importance of "conducting further analysis to gain insights from the qualitative survey questions and will investigate the experience of different groups in more depth". The Crafts Council survey reported some makers' ability to make work was impacted by "family commitments" (Crafts Council UK, , para. 2). This does not seem to acknowledge that the inability to generate an income during the crisis might depend on other factors, such as caring responsibilities, which overall might influence the make-up of the sector and exacerbate inequalities in the long-term. This is particularly relevant for freelance and self-employed creative workers who might already be disadvantaged in their career progression due to caring responsibilities (McDowall et al., ). Furthermore, as it has been evidenced, the impact of the virus has been greater in areas of the UK, which are economically disadvantaged and with larger ethnic minority populations (Khunti et al., ). Therefore, it is likely that the virus will have a greater impact in these communities, which are already under-represented in the sector (O'Brien et al., ). Another important consideration might be the uneven impact on workers at different career stages. In particular, the bigger challenges faced by those early in their career - to be eligible for the SEISS you had to be trading in the 2018-2019 tax year - or even recent graduates already experiencing salary disadvantages without the Covid-19 crisis (Comunian et al., ). The implication, as noticed by the Creative Cardiff report, is potentially workers leaving the sector

This impact does not just threaten freelance businesses [...] Others were thinking of abandoning the creative industries - until now, one of the UK's most buoyant and fastest growing sectors - altogether. [...] "I am currently looking into ways to work outside the creative industries sector as I don't see there being any sustainable future in this sector." (Komorowski & Lewis, , p. 2)

The second invisible element was the lack of reflection on the long-term implications of the crisis both in relation to the personal/individual and the ecosystem. None of the live surveys included questions about multiple job-holding, potentially masking the complexity of CCW, which often involves portfolio working (Ashton, ). One completed survey reported on the security of additional income not derived from creative work (Circus Works, ). One other acknowledged the combination of short-term PAYE work and freelance work: "A quarter of creative freelancers reported having an employment record that combines short term PAYE employment with freelance work" (Komorowski & Lewis, , p. 6). The short-term outcome of this portfolio activity might be ineligibility for government support, longer-term there might be a breakdown of the ecosystem of provision of these type of freelance activities for key economic growth sectors of the CIs. Considering the acknowledged complexity of the networks on which CCW rely (Comunian, ), it is important not to look at the impact on freelancers - for example - in isolation. Across the sample, there was limited reflection on connections across services and supply chains and the pipeline of CCIs. The Crafts Council () reported a loss of work from other sectors (i.e. fashion) and the Creative Cardiff report stated that "A breakdown in the freelance workforce will have multiplier effects across creative sectors. They are embedded in supply chains - notably in film and TV production - which may collapse if the freelance population is reduced." (Komorowski & Lewis, , p. 6), thus acknowledging long-term and more structural changes that might take place.

Amongst these long-term and structural changes will be a range of different impacts for each sector, particularly where audiences might take longer to feel safe attending events or performances. While the rush to transfer content online and think of new innovative digital solutions might provide opportunities for some, it will inevitably leave many behind. Furthermore, as suggested by the ScreenSkills' report (), this will increase pressure for a digital up-skilling of the CCW. Critically, CCW are likely to have to pay for this up-skilling and take time off work for training without further forms of support. The struggle to operate and co-operate internationally might, of course, impact touring activities but also the general mobility of skills and knowledge. Finally, a longer-term systematic impact might be a greater struggle for creative graduates to enter the sector in the next few years and also to find the motivation and financial backing to enter the creative higher education sector (Comunian, Dent, et al., ).

Conclusions

In a period of ongoing global uncertainty, this paper has provided an early evidence-based reflection on how Covid-19 might impact the CCIs and CCWs based on the current data collection taking place across the sector. In particular, we have argued through the meta-analysis framework that it is important to pause to reflect on the value of the surveys and data that have been/ will be generated and reflect more closely on what is being captured and what has not received enough attention and visibility. Our contribution and policy recommendations can be, therefore summarized in three points that follow.

Position CCW concerns as structural issues, not as a result of Covid-19. Presenting existing literature alongside the meta-analysis of the recent surveys has revealed that, while policy and sectoral concerns are valid, they are in many ways investigating structural issues of CCW which are now becoming increasingly visible (Comunian & Conor, ) but have always been present. The findings discussed in most of the completed reports do not do enough to acknowledge that Covid-19 is an emergency that exacerbates the precarious structural conditions of the sector and that a short-term response is not the only change that might be needed. Therefore, while we acknowledge that most of the organizations who rushed to assess the impact of the crisis are trying to lobby for immediate support, it is also important that they do not reduce these issues to Covid-19. If they do so, they risk that any support or intervention is understood and perceived as a response to exceptional circumstances rather than the need for long-term structural changes in the sector and its working conditions more generally.

Make CCW demographics visible. Amongst the findings of our meta-analysis, the invisibility of the demographic characteristics of respondents represented the most critical issue. The focus on livelihoods without discussing demographic characteristics does not seem to acknowledge that the impact of Covid-19 will be highly varied for different components of the CCW. The groups which are acknowledged in the literature as being more marginalized might end-up being the ones paying the higher price. This has not been made visible enough and certainly requires more investigation by policy bodies and academic researchers. The uneven impact of Covid-19 is very likely to result in the exacerbation of existing inequalities (O'Brien et al., ). The immediate impact is that funding and support provisions based on these survey findings may fail to reach those most in need, and this will impact who will be able to continue working in the CCW and who will leave these unsustainable careers. This, more worryingly, will make the sector less diverse and less inclusive in the long-term.

The resilience discourse should connect with sustainable development perspectives for the sector. We argue that the long-term issue of sustainability and sustainable livelihoods - beyond the immediate impact - is not made explicit enough. In the literature, we drew attention to the way the rhetoric of resilience (Gupta & Gupta, ), now also a global campaign (UNESCO, ), seems to become an accepted response to the long-term development and under-investment in the sector. However, the lack of mention of opportunities or strategies for "resilience" in the surveys or by surveying organizations seems to highlight that these organizations are aware that the sector and its lean structure do not provide any managerial or organizational buffers to rethink its future development. We argue this suggests that both academics and policymakers should rethink the rhetoric of resilience in CCW and consider the longer-term implications of transformations in employment structures during and following periods of economic crisis. In particular, we argue that in order to value and expect resilience, there is a need to reflect on how - before any shock - the system is supported and developed within a sustainable framework. Marchese et al. () review the often-inconsistent accounts of the relationship between resilience and sustainability and their frameworks. Thinking of resilience is often a short-term perspective that does not account for how the sector needs longer-term planning (and rethinking) for sustainable and inclusive growth (Wilson et al., ) that will, in turn, provide future resilience. Of course, this requires a critical reflection on the business models and inner workings of the sector and possibly a shift away from discourses of economic growth towards emerging new agendas of creative social economies (Comunian, Rickmers, et al., ).

Acknowledgements

Dr Roberta Comunian would like to thank the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (No. 822314) "Developing inclusive and sustainable creative economies" (DISCE) www.disce.eu. In particular, she would like to thank the DISCE King's College London research team for their valuable inputs on issues of inclusivity and sustainability in creative and cultural work.

Notes on contributors

Dr. Roberta Comunian is Reader in Creative Economy at the Department for Culture, Media and Creative Industries at King's College London. She is interested in the relationship between public and private investments in the arts and cultural regeneration projects, cultural and creative work and creative social economies. She has previously researched the role of higher education in the creative economy and has explored in various papers the career opportunities of creative graduates in UK. She has published extensively on the creative and cultural industries in local development and the role of networks and complexity in this area of research. She has recently coordinated an AHRC funded research network on Creative Economies in Africa and is currently involved in the H2020 funded research project DISCE: Developing inclusive and sustainable creative economies.

Dr. Lauren England is a Lecturer in the Department of Culture, Media & Creative Industries at King's College London. Her PhD, conducted in partnership with Crafts Council UK, investigated higher education and sustainable business development in the UK's contemporary craft sector. Lauren has published research on the evolution of craft knowledge and skills in post-industrial regions, creative social enterprises, and reports on craft entrepreneurship and higher education policy via the Crafts Council. She is currently researching emerging creative economies and fashion design in Africa, and circular economy opportunities for UK designer-makers.

1 It is hard to provide a univocal definition of creative and cultural work as so many different and parallel definitions are in place at multiple times. For the purpose of this article we use creative and cultural work and/or creative and cultural workforce (CCW) to identify the workers engaging either in creative occupations (as defined by DCMS, ). This includes creative occupations within the creative and cultural industries (a dancer in a dance company) as well as creative occupations in other industries (a designer in a car manufacturing company) or working in in the creative and cultural industries covering other non-creative functions (an accountant working in a film production company). This definition corresponds to the one used by UK policy mapping, defined there as creative economy (DCMS, ). It also allows us to include a range of literatures in our reviews as other definitions, including creative labour, cultural work, creative and cultural industries (CCIs), refer to sub-sections of these occupations, which are included in the broader CCW category used here.

2 On March 16th people were officially advised to avoid all non-essential contact with others. On March 20th all bars, pubs, cafes, theatres and social venues were closed. Full lockdown was introduced across the UK from 23 rd March 2020. The first UK government emergency support package (£12bn) was announced 11 th March, followed on March 17 th by government-backed loans and tax cuts and grants for companies under threat of collapse. On March 20 th the government announced the Job Retention Scheme (aka. furlough scheme) and the self-employment package (SEISS) was announced on March 26th. The last scheme to be announced was 'Bounce Back' loans for SMEs on May 4th. Additional national support has been announced by the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish governments.

3 This survey closed 16th March, prior to the closure of theatres and announcement of the Job Retention Scheme (20th March).

4 Some variation in support requested could be seen between those surveys focused on individuals or organisations (see table 1)

5 Covid-19 specific support includes a Job Retention Scheme, a Self-Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS), Protection from Eviction for Commercial Tenants, a Business Interruption Loan Scheme, Cash Grants for Retail, Hospitality and Leisure, Small Business Grant Funding; Statutory Sick Pay Rebates; Time to Pay; VAT Deferral and Deferral of Self-Assessment Payments, and Corporate Financing https://www.creativeindustriesfederation.com/news/covid-19-support-government.

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Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by H2020: [grant number 822314].

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Creative and cultural work without filters: Covid-19 and exposed precarity in the creative economy

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ABSTRACT The precarious nature of creative and cultural work is widely acknowledged in academic literature. However, it has often been invisible in the eyes of policy and policymaking. As soon as the spread of Covid-19 started impacting local and national economies across the globe, many industry and policy bodies rushed into researching the impact of Covid-19 on the creative and cultural industries (CCIs) and the workers in the sector.

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Graduating at a time of crisis: Covid-19 and career challenges for creative graduates

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Graduating at a time of crisis: Covid-19 and career challenges for creative graduates

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Graduating at a time of crisis: Covid-19 and career challenges for creative graduates

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Written by Dr Roberta Comunian and Dr Lauren England , King's College London

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What professional development/ employability skills do you feel students need now and in the future?

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What professional development/ employability skills do you feel students need now and in the future?