Cultural life often comes with a cost. Although participation in many cultural activities is free, enjoying most cultural activities and products—such as travel, film, books, stationery, handicrafts, clothing, music, and other products—requires setting aside a separate budget.
The household cultural spending indicator shows us society's relationship with the cultural industries. In recent years, various events have overshadowed the level of household cultural spending in Iran. The most important of these events was the coronavirus pandemic, which caused Iranian households to record their lowest cultural spending in 1399 (2020/21).
The average cultural spending of Iranian households has followed an upward trend in nominal terms, so that this figure reached 261 hemt (trillion tomans) in 1401 (2022/23). What matters, however, is the real value of spending, which can make the path clear for researchers and policymakers.
On this basis, the average cultural spending of Iranian households from 1396 to 1401 (2017–2023), adjusted for inflation and people's purchasing power, indicates a downward trend in this area. In the same vein, the share of household cultural spending has also declined, falling from 11.5 percent in 1396 (2017/18) to 9.3 percent in 1401 (2022/23).
See the original infographic (Persian)
Machine-translated from Persian by Namafar; the Persian original is authoritative. Read the original in Persian