Accredited official statistics

Economic Estimates: Employment in DCMS sectors and Digital sector, January 2022 to December 2022.

National Statistics used to provide an estimate of the contribution of DCMS Sectors and Digital Sector to the UK economy, measured by employment.

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About

These Economic Estimates are used to provide an estimate of the contribution of DCMS Sectors, and separately the Digital Sector, to the UK economy, measured by employment (number of filled jobs). These estimates are calculated based on the Office for National Statistics (ONS) Annual Population Survey (APS).

Content

DCMS Sectors

These statistics cover the contributions of the following DCMS sectors to the UK economy;

  • Civil Society
  • Creative Industries
  • Cultural Sector
  • Gambling
  • Sport

Tourism is not included as the data is not yet available. The release also includes estimates for the Audio Visual sector and Computer Games subsector.

Users should note that there is overlap between DCMS sector definitions. In particular, several Cultural Sector industries are simultaneously Creative Industries.

A definition for each sector is available in the tables published alongside this release. Further information on all these sectors is available in the associated technical report along with details of methods and data limitations.

Headline findings:

In the 2022 calendar year, there were approximately 3.9 million filled jobs in the DCMS Sectors (excluding Tourism), an increase of 322,000 (8.9%) since 2019 and 85,000 (2.2%) since 2021.

Since pre-pandemic (2019), driving the growth in included DCMS sector employment was the Creative Industries (14.1% increase). Over this period, employment also grew in the Civil Society sector (4.9% increase) and Cultural Sector (2.7% increase), however remained below 2019 (pre-pandemic) levels in the Sports sector (3.8% decrease) and Gambling sector (0.5% decrease).

Although there is wide variation between sectors in terms of demographic breakdowns, overall the proportion of filled jobs held by women, and the proportion of jobs held by disabled people, was lower in the included DCMS Sectors than the UK overall. As of the 2022 calendar year, within the included DCMS Sectors there were 45.3% (vs 48.1% UK workforce overall) of filled jobs held by women and 15.8% (vs 16.4% UK workforce overall) held by disabled people.

Digital Sector:

These statistics also cover the contributions of the following Digital sectors to the UK economy

  • Digital Sector
  • Of which: Telecoms

Users should note that the Telecoms sector sits wholly within the Digital Sector.

A definition for each sector is available in the tables published alongside this release. Further information on all these sectors is available in the associated technical report along with details of methods and data limitations.

Headline findings:

In the 2022 calendar year, there were approximately 1.9 million filled jobs in the Digital Sector, an increase of 325,000 (20.9%) since 2019 and 73,000 (4.1%) since 2021.

Compared to the UK workforce overall, the Digital Sector has a lesser share of filled jobs held by women or people with a disability. As of 2022, within the Digital Sector there were 29.3% (vs 48.1% UK workforce overall) of filled jobs held by women and 12.5% (vs 16.4% UK workforce overall) held by disabled people.

Released

First published on 13 July 2023.

Pre-release access

A document is provided that contains a list of ministers and officials who have received privileged early access to this release. In line with best practice, the list has been kept to a minimum and those given access for briefing purposes had a maximum of 24 hours.

The UK Statistics Authority

This release is published in accordance with the Code of Practice for Statistics, as produced by the UK Statistics Authority. The Authority has the overall objective of promoting and safeguarding the production and publication of official statistics that serve the public good. It monitors and reports on all official statistics, and promotes good practice in this area.

The responsible analyst for this release is George Ashford.

For further details about the estimates, or to be added to a distribution list for future updates, please email us at evidence@dcms.gov.uk.

Updates to this page

Published 13 July 2023
Last updated 28 July 2023 + show all updates
  1. Added Technical and quality assurance reports.

  2. First published.

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