Public funding for US arts--a sad state

Chicago:  no place or money for arts education.

I've been down this path many times, comparing the amount of public funding accorded arts organization in the United States (total) with mere cities in Europe.  A new study by the Cultural Policy Center of the University of Chicago lays out the numbers.  They are disheartening to say the least.  Intended primarily for its Chicago base, the study offers comparative data with other metropolitan areas across the country.

There is a telling chart of local dollars spent, per capita, on page 16 of the report.  I was unable to duplicate it, but a summary of some of that information is seen below.  It appears as though, in terms of the quality of life that I prefer, San Francisco and Cleveland (of all cities!) are the places to be.

LOCAL DOLLARS, PER CAPITA
Figure 9 depicts local arts agencies’ competitive dollars awarded on a per capita basis, which largely reflects the ranking of cities/metro regions by total levels of local competitive funding. San Francisco ($12.95) and Cuyahoga County (Cleveland) ($12.48) awarded the highest per capita amounts in terms of competitive local grant dollars. Miami-Dade County ($5.08) and San Diego ($4.63) provided closer to the average per capita funding ($5.51), whereas the nine remaining cites/metro regions award less than $3.00 per capita (Figure 10). Excluding Baltimore, which did not offer any city-funded grants, Chicago’s, Boston’s, and Phoenix’s local arts agencies provided the smallest per capita grant support amounts in 2012.