Small and rural communities across the country continue to face drastic population shifts and economic upheaval. Many efforts are underway in these areas to create and implement economic revitalization strategies. In analyzing resources, strengths, and needs, communities are increasingly seeing the potential of their existing creative economies ﾝsectors of the economy that include arts, culture and heritage organizations, businesses, and workers ﾝas strong revenue, employment, and quality of life generators, or "creative industries."

The Center for Arts and Culture has published a year-long series of issue papers entitled <EM>Art, Culture, and the National Agenda</EM> to demonstrate how public policy decisions affect our nation's cultural life. This paper, the fifth in the series, looks at the relationship of education, creativity, and the 21st-century workforce.

The authors of this article researched compensation data available through the American Council for the Arts to ascertain whether or not disparities in pay existed among male and female arts administrators. Pay discrimination was found to exist in the arts administration profession. The ACA data support the premise that pay discrimination is a real issue that needs addressing.

The author focuses on how urban policies and the clustering of creative industries has influenced urban outcomes. The set of creative industries include those with output protectable under some form of intellectual property law. More specifically, this sub-sector encompasses software, multimedia, video games, industrial design, fashion, publishing, and research and development

The author describes the struggle of American cities to reinvent themselves for the post-industrial economy and the pivotal role the arts play in that process.

The article provides information on the importance of the creative sector to the U.S. economy.