Public opinion on government funding of the arts in the United States: demographic and political factors

Abstract

ABSTRACT I examine associations between demographic and political factors and attitudes regarding government funding of the arts in the United States. I also generate dynamic, state-level estimates of public opinion on governmental support the arts from 1990 to 2016. While elite rhetoric and policy proposals sometimes call for major reductions in government funding for the arts, I find no evidence of majority support for cutting arts spending at the national level during this period. At the state level, majorities supported reducing government funding for the arts only rarely. I find that partisanship and ideology are associated with support for government funding to a modest extent. While ideologically conservative members of the public were more likely than others to want to cut arts spending, majorities of Republicans favoured maintaining or increasing government spending on the arts in three of the four survey years analyzed. Overall, proposals to substantially reduce public funding of the arts in the United States were not well-aligned with public opinion.