*Required - A163 intro course for BS in Arts Management degree

The course provides students with a taste of the variety of topics
they will encounter when pursuing the BS in Arts Management,
including public policy in the arts, the economic structure of
markets in various branches of the arts, and the issues facing
administrators in the arts.

At the heart of each of these topics is the question of what makes
cultural goods – literature, recorded music, live opera
performances, paintings, films, and so on – different from humdrum
goods like socks, tires, apples, and auto insurance. Once we have
started to form an answer to that question, we can begin to
investigate such matters as whether the government ought to
subsidize artists, and if it should by what criteria it should award
subsidies, why some artists can earn millions of dollars per year,
while most receive earnings that are less than average for
individuals with so much specialized training, why movie studios
have come to produce more action movies laden with special effects,
why books come out in hardcover before they appear in paperback, why
most fine arts organizations are nonprofit rather than for-profit,
and many other questions.

The course cannot possibly be comprehensive on all aspects of the
arts, but we will at least provide a framework that students can
then apply to thinking about the arts in society.