The number of Canadians who earned most of their income from the arts topped 140,000 in Canada in 2006, according to a report based on statistics from the 2006 census.
That made artists more numerous than auto workers -- about 135,000 Canadians worked in the auto sector in 2006 -- according to a report from Hill Strategies in Hamilton, Ont., created for the Ontario Arts Council, Canadian Heritage and the Canada Council for the Arts.
Canadian artists remain among the most impoverished of the working poor, earning an average annual income of $22,700, about 37 per cent less than the rest of the Canadian workforce.
And not all of that income is earned in the arts -- the census doesn't ask how much artists might make as waitresses and busboys, says Kelly Hill, president of Hill Strategies.
"Those earnings are included in the statistics. It's even more depressing from that standpoint," he told CBC News.
