SCPS Faculty Profile
Big Apple’s Billion-Dollar Arts “Industry” Vital to its Economic Health
Rosemary Scanlon
Clinical associate professor of Real Estate, NYU Schack Institute of Real Estate
With its annual, $46.9 billion injection into New York’s economy, the Arts are an integral and invaluable part of the state’s financial dynamic. So concludes the latest update of Rosemary Scanlon’s seminal study, The Arts as an Industry: Their Economic Impact on New York City and New York State, initiated 20 years ago, when she was the chief economist of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. The Arts are among New York’s top attractions for domestic and international visitors, according to Scanlon. As visitors flock to the city’s world-renowned, cultural attractions, such as museums, galleries, and theater, the by-product of such attention, together with the proceeds of the city’s growing TV and film industry, is a boost to every sector, including finance, real estate, and tourism.
A former New York State Deputy Comptroller (1993-97), she is one of the world’s leading experts in regional and urban economics and her influential study demonstrates the essential link between an expansive and thriving arts-based culture and a healthy economy.
Now at NYU for seven years, Scanlon teaches real estate economics in the graduate real estate program. A native of Canada, where she received her undergraduate and graduate degrees, she is also a graduate of the Program for Management Development at the Harvard Business School and was a visiting Research Fellow at the London School of Economics from 1997-99, where she recommended establishing an office of chief economist for the new government of London. She is a consultant on urban and regional economics; a highly published author of economic studies, and a frequent guest speaker in Australia, Canada, Asia, and Europe.
Publication of The Arts as an Industry: Their Economic Impact on New York City and New York State was sponsored and funded by The Alliance for the Arts.