The creative economy: the rise and risks of intangible capital and the future of creative work

Aesthetic, expressive and design capabilities are the sin qua non of creative work, and are needed across the whole economy, not just in the media, art and design sectors. The future of this creative economy is affected by increasing global investment in intangible assets such as research and development, designs, patents, creative works, software, platforms, brands, and business methodologies. Intangible assets are easy to move, can be scaled with low costs, and rapidly accelerate competitive advantage for early movers. These characteristics create the conditions for dominant global companies to emerge that eliminate or fractionate creative work into low-paid jobs. But the creation, combination and deployment of intangible assets has high up-front costs, and demands diverse creative workers with very high levels of skill. This creates growth in some categories of creative work. This techno-social evolution is changing how, where, when, for whom, and with what conditions, creative work occurs.