Investment over cuts: Ireland’s plan to save the arts
Hi, I'm Chris! I've been keeping the Datawrapper office running as a working student for almost a year now. For my very first Weekly Chart piece, I wanted to look at something I've been curious about for a while: Ireland has been running a basic income program, the first of its kind in Europe, and just a month ago, made it permanent! Let’s dive into it.
The program
In October 2022, Ireland started paying 2,000 randomly selected artists €325 a week. The Basic Income for the Arts (BIA) pilot was born out of the COVID-19 pandemic, designed to stabilize a sector that had been hit especially hard.
To evaluate whether the scheme would truly make a difference, the Irish government established a control group and commissioned two independent studies, a two-year impact assessment and a cost-benefit analysis, both published in September 2025.
Results are in!
At the start of the pilot, both groups looked similar: around 4–6% of artists in each group had not worked in the arts in the previous six months. Two years later, the groups had drifted far apart. In the control group, artists without the basic income, that share had risen to 13.5%. Among BIA recipients, it stayed at 5.5%.
In other words, without the basic income, roughly one in seven artists stopped working in the arts within two years. With it, almost no one did.
The effect showed up elsewhere too. BIA recipients spent, on average, 11 more hours per week on their creative practice compared to the control group. They were 14 percentage points more likely to have completed new works. And they invested €250 more per month in their practice, on equipment, workspaces, and materials. They also earned €500 more on average than the control group.
Return on investment
None of this came at a cost higher than anticipated. According to the cost-benefit analysis, every €1 invested returned €1.39 to society.
Roughly €80 million of the just over €100 million in total benefits came not from economic output, but from improvements in psychological well-being.
Artists on the scheme reported significantly less depression, less anxiety, and higher life satisfaction than their counterparts in the control group. While they spent 3.5 fewer hours per week on work outside the arts, they redirected that time into their creative practice.
Making sure the arts are here to stay
Ireland is now the first country in the world to take a sectoral basic income from pilot to permanent policy. Starting in 2026, the scheme will continue in three-year cycles, with 2,000 artists selected by lottery. The long-term goal, according to the government, is to eventually extend it to all artists.
The program may not settle the global debate over universal basic income, because it remains narrow in scope, limited to one sector, and is born of a particular economic moment, but it adds fresh evidence to a long-running discussion on a modern welfare state, and is already yielding measurable returns. This also comes at times when public budgets in Argentina, the United States, or Germany are subjected to strict auditing and spending cuts.
In Berlin, where I live, the Senate is cutting cultural funding by €130 million, with district culture funds slashed by 25%. Across Germany, politicians call for a “Ruck”, a jolt of courage, modernization, and daring to do more. The reality, however, looks different.
Meanwhile, Ireland demonstrates that providing a group of people (especially in precarious fields, such as artists) with financial stability benefits everyone. In the end, with all the evidence at hand, the question doesn’t seem to be whether we can afford to be courageous, it's whether we can afford not to be. And in times of political mistrust, we need some real political bravery more than ever.
That’s it from me this time! Next week, our co-CEO David will take care of the Weekly Chart – we’ll see you then!
