Culture and money flows

Introduction and significance of the theme

Like the Raad voor Cultuur in the report Access to culture emphasized, the value of culture is multifaceted (Raad voor Cultuur 2024). Culture represents first and foremost an essential, intrinsic value. In this way, culture enriches people's lives and society as a whole. At the same time, culture has a social value thanks to its positive influence on mental and physical health (Gielen et al. 2020, Berkers et al. 2021). And culture also generates an economic value.

According to calculations by Statistics Netherlands, the added economic value of the cultural and creative sectors combined amounted to 29,9 billion euros in 2022 (3,4 percent of the bbp). If we look specifically at the cultural sector then this amount amounts to approximately 21 billion euros of added value to the Dutch economy. Indirectly, the sector delivers much more economic value. Cultural facilities have a positive financial effect on small and medium-sized enterprises, the investment and business climate and real estate prices at a local level (CBS 2025d, Raad voor Cultuur 2024).

On this page we will discuss the financial flows to the cultural sector that help to create this intrinsic, social and economic value. We build on previous research by Berenschot (2025) and Geven in Nederland (2024) in particular. And we use data from the EU, the Dutch government and Statistics Netherlands (CBS) on government expenditure and information from various annual reports and monitors from industry associations, cultural organisations and charities. In doing so, we map out how the cultural sector is financed and how the financial flows relate to each other.  

In 2023 were the income of the cultural sector in the Netherlands at least 6,3 billionThis minimum amount is based on an analysis of government expenditure on culture, donations and sponsorship by citizens and companies and the own income of subsidized cultural organizations. generated.

The income of the cultural sector can be divided into three main categories:

1. Government expenditure: at least 3,96 billion euros. 
   These are resources from municipalities, provinces and the central government, but also from supranational organisations such as UNESCO and the European Union. 

2. Private contributions: at least 389 million euros. 
   This concerns contributions from private funds and friends' associations, donations from private individuals, corporate sponsorship, and lottery contributions. An unknown portion of these private contributions goes to the unsubsidized cultural sectors.

3. Own income of cultural organizations within the subsidized sectors: at least 1,97 billion euros.
   This amount is indicative. It concerns income from, for example, the sale of tickets, products or services, copyright or image rights, or hospitality and rental income.
   If we also include the revenue in the non-subsidized cultural sectors, the amount is at least 3,85 billion euros. These are not dependent on government support for their income, although many apply for subsidies nonetheless.

Stable relations, deteriorating financial situation
The ratios between these financial flows show that the cultural sector derives a substantial part of its income from its programming and activities. However, government contributions constitute the largest source of income. Private contributions make up a smaller share of the income. The ratios between these three funding streams have remained virtually unchanged over the past two decades, with the exception of the years during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The financial situation in the cultural sector has come under increasing pressure over the past two decades, as has also the Raad voor Cultuur notes in his advisory report Everyone their share (2025). Government spending on culture as a percentage of the total budget declined steadily between 2005 and 2023. Due to this decline, the Dutch government spent 1,26 billion euros less on culture in 2023 compared to the percentage in 2005.

In addition, the sector's total revenues did not keep pace with inflation during the same period: while inflation stood at 49 percent between 2005 and 2023, government spending (42 percent), own revenues (47 percent), and private contributions (20 percent) rose at a slower rate. As a result, the sector's total revenues grew 6,5 percentage points slower than inflation.

The own revenues of cultural organizations have risen almost in line with inflation over the past twenty years. At the same time, the Council warns in its advice that rising costs (as a result of inflation and the implementation of fair practice en fair pay) cannot be compensated for by constantly raising (ticket) prices. The report Cultural Participation in Figures shows that in 2024, 32 percent of the Dutch found the cultural activities they wanted to attend too expensive (Hoog & Swartjes, 2026). Finally, the council shows that private contributions only follow when the government emphasizes the importance of culture and makes public funds available.

It shows that the sector has been under increasing financial pressure for years. While the costs keep rising, there is extremely little financial room to grow.

Below, we delve deeper into each of the three cash flows and show which developments are currently at play.

Government spending

The Dutch government has a legal responsibility for creating the right conditions within which cultural expression can be expressed independently. The State, the provinces and the municipalities support cultural institutions separately from each other via structural and incidental fundsIn total, the Dutch government provided 2023 certainly 3,9 billion to culture. In addition, there are limited resources available for culture from, among others, the European Union, UNESCO and the Council of Europe.

The Dutch government's expenditure on culture amounts to approximately 0,4 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP). When expenditure on broadcasting and written media is also included, this amounts to a total of 0,6 percent of GDP. This is lower than the EU average of 0,7 percent for culture, broadcasting and media. This puts the Netherlands in 20th place out of 27 EU countries (Polivtseva 2024).

Total government expenditure on culture has not kept pace with inflation; this applies particularly to municipal expenditure (see graph below). In addition, both the central government and municipalities have steadily spent an increasingly smaller percentage of their total budget on culture over the same period. For the central government, this percentage fell from 0,62 percent in 2005 to 0,41 percent in 2023, and for municipalities from 4,16 percent to 3,20 percent. Assuming a comparable level of cultural expenditure in 2023 compared to 2005, government expenditure combined would be more than 1,2 billion euros higher than was the case in 2023. Partly for this reason, the advised Raad voor Cultuur the State to catch up by increasing the annual culture budget by 250 million euros and, in addition, to enshrine an annual wage and inflation adjustment in law (Raad voor Cultuur 2025). 

The division of tasks between the central government, the provinces and municipalities is discussed appointments made. So on January 17, 2025 nine new cultural covenants concluded between the central government and various provinces or cultural regions for the period 2025-2028.

Average municipal expenditure increased from 108 euros per inhabitant in 2017 to 127 euros per inhabitant in 2023: an increase of 18 percent. However, this increase is lower than inflation in the same period (24 percent). In the same period, expenditure on culture compared to total municipal expenditure also decreased from 3,6 percent to 3,2 percent. On balance, municipalities have therefore spent less on culture. 

Municipalities finance their tasks with their own tax revenues supplemented with resources from the municipal fund, originating from the national government. A large part of the tasks has a legal obligation, but for culture, municipalities determine themselves which ambitions they set and how much money they spend on culture. 

However, municipal funding is increasingly under severe pressure. This is due, on the one hand, to rising costs for mandatory tasks such as youth and elderly care, leaving less room for other tasks. On the other hand, there is a new, less favorable system by which the level and adjustment of grants from the Municipal Fund are determined. Initially, this led to worrying financial forecasts for municipalities from 2026 onwards, frequently referred to as the ravine year (Rietveld 2025). In 2025, it was decided to provide additional funds from the central government (VNG 2025), thereby alleviating the pressure until 2028. An analysis by BMC (Ormel & Peters 2025) shows that many municipalities are still forced to make cuts, in some cases also to cultural subsidies.

Differences between municipalities
Per capita expenditure on culture is generally relatively high in larger municipalities compared to smaller municipalities. For example, expenditure on culture in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague and Utrecht averages 255 euros per inhabitant, while in municipalities with 10 to 20 thousand inhabitants it is 52 euros. per inhabitant. Half of municipal cultural expenditure is made by municipalities with 150.000 inhabitants or more, while only three out of ten Dutch people live there. Due to their central function, these large municipalities have a higher number of cultural facilities, often with a larger capacity and a catchment area that is larger than their own municipality. A higher level of facilities logically leads to an increase in expenditure.

In the dashboard of the Culture Monitor Municipal expenditure on culture is also included per spending target.

The provinces of Friesland and Zeeland spend relatively the most on culture, while South Holland and North Holland spend relatively little on culture per capita. The extent to which provinces spend resources on culture depends on the role that provinces see for themselves within the cultural system (Wijn et al. 2022). As a rule, the expenditure of a province is related to the expenditure of the municipalities within that province: if the municipalities within the province spend relatively little on culture, the expenditure of the provinces is relatively high and vice versa. If the municipal and provincial expenditure are added together, the local authorities in Groningen and Limburg will spend the most money on culture per inhabitant in 2023. 

In the dashboard of the Culture Monitor provincial expenditure on culture is also included per spending target.

Basic infrastructure
Within the BIS, subsidies are awarded to cultural organisations, both directly and indirectly via the six National Cultural Funds. 2023 the total expenditure on the BIS amounted to 518 million euros, 40 percent of the total cultural budget of OCW. Of this, 242 million (47 percent) was granted directly to institutions and 276 million (53 percent) was spent via the National Cultural Funds. 

The BIS subsidy is awarded every four years established: the current cultural plan period runs from 2025 to 2028. However, the principles for this were already established in 2023 by the then State Secretary for Culture Gunay Uslu (Uslu 2023). A total of 119 BIS institutions have been included and another 301 cultural organisations are financed on a multi-year basis from the six National Cultural Funds (Bruins 2024).

Each of the six national cultural funds supports a specific domain: Film Fund (film), Cultural Participation Fund (cultural participation and education), Performing Arts Fund (performing arts), Dutch Literature Fund (literature), Mondriaan Fund (visual arts and heritage) and the Creative Industries Stimulation Fund (architecture, digital culture and design). In addition to multi-year subsidies to institutions, the national cultural funds also provide project subsidies. The ratio between multi-year support for institutions and project-based subsidy provision differs greatly from domain to domain. This difference is also visible in the ratio between direct support to BIS institutions and subsidies from one of the funds.  

At this moment we have no insight into the precise spending of the project subsidies from the National Cultural Funds in terms of the number of awards, precise amounts or geographical distribution. More insight into these figures can contribute to a better informed debate on the regional distribution of government funds for culture.

National Cultural Funds are tasked not only with focusing on the European Netherlands, but also on the Caribbean part of the Kingdom. To increase the visibility of and access to the funds, the funds launched a joint website in 2025 aimed at applicants in Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao, Saba, Sint Eustatius, and Sint Maarten: rijkscultuurfondsen.org.

Featured: system change
Over the past decades, the subsidy system has been adjusted multiple times, each time with different starting points, subsidy criteria, incentive schemes, and action plans. Cultural scholars Edwin van Meerkerk and Quirijn van den Hoogen describe these successive changes as a process of increasing bureaucratization (2023). Against this background, De advises Raad voor Cultuur to extend the subsidy term for BIS institutions from four to eight years starting in 2029. According to the Council, a longer period offers institutions more stability, room for long-term development, and less administrative burden. At the same time, the Council acknowledges that longer periods increase the risk of the system becoming less accessible to new initiatives and innovation; therefore, shorter terms remain possible. The Raad voor Cultuur calls on municipalities and provinces to follow this example where possible (Raad voor Cultuur 2025). A legislative proposal to make this possible is in preparation (Rijksoverheid 2025b).

Heritage Act
Since 2014, the Heritage Act has been in place, which regulates the management of the Dutch heritage collection. There are 30 museum institutions that have the task of managing the National Collection. Until 2020, the subsidies for these museums came partly from resources that fell under the Heritage Act (maintenance of the buildings) and partly from the BIS (the management and maintenance of the National Collection and public activities). From 2021, the financing of museums that manage the National Collection falls entirely under the Heritage Act. However, since 2021, space has been made in the BIS for a regional museum in each province. 

The budget of the museums within the Heritage Act came in 2023 to a total of 249,5 million euros. In addition, the Heritage Act also includes the care of monuments, for which 146,5 million euros were reserved. Together this amounts to 396 million. 

The subsidies within the Heritage Act are re-established annually, but generally go to the same organisations and institutions. It is possible that monuments or institutions will be added, such as Erfgoedpark Batavialand in 2024. Expenditure within the Heritage Act is therefore expected to increase based on annual price and inflation adjustments and slight fluctuations in the number of monuments.

Other expenditures of the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science
In addition to the direct funding of institutions and funds via the BIS (518 million euros) and the expenditure within the Heritage Act (397 million euros), there are other expenditures on the cultural budget of the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science. In total, this amounts to 371 million in 2023. 

These expenses include costs for library facilities (70 million euros), regional archives (31 million euros) and a number of additional subsidy schemes (128 million euros). An example is the Cultural Participation Programme, which aims to stimulate cultural participation for people for whom this is not self-evident. Among other things, the pilot of the Cultural Youth Passport (CJP) for a culture card with a budget for secondary vocational education has received a subsidy from this programme. 

The budget also includes room for a contribution to the National Archives (61 million euros), international organisations (UNESCO and Eurimages; 1,8 million euros) and to fellow authorities (47 million euros), such as the establishment of the slavery museum or the preservation of heritage in earthquake zones. Finally, there are a number of other items such as assignments (24 million euros) for policy research, knowledge and research programmes and other subjects.  

Cultural expenditures of other ministries
In addition to the expenditure by the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, other ministries also spend money on culture. In total, this amounted to 2023 to at least 33 millionThe Ministry of Foreign Affairs (BuZa) spent 8,3 million euros on the promotion of Dutch art and culture abroad and the preservation, management, and accessibility of shared cultural heritage. The Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport (VWS) is responsible for funding cultural events for war victims and the commemoration of the Second World War. It spent a total of 6,1 million euros on national memorial centers and war museums. The Ministry of the Interior (BZK) allocates funds to cultural initiatives concerning Kingdom relations. In 2023, it did not yet spend any money in the context of the shared history of slavery. This only happened a year later. Finally, the Ministry of Defence contributes financially to the Defence Museums Foundation and to the National Military Tattoo. In total, this amounted to 18,5 million euros in 2023 (Government of the Netherlands 2024b). In 2023, Berenschot pointed out in its report In the spotlight also on the possibilities for the cultural sector to access funding streams from other ministries and government bodies in addition to the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science (Vinkenburg and Branten 2023).

Featured: cultural expenditures in the Caribbean part of the Kingdom
The governments of the six islands that together make up the Caribbean part of the Kingdom – Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao, Saba, Sint Eustatius, and Sint Maarten – all also spend on culture. Converted into euros, the amounts spent are limited to a few million, which is logical given the scale and population numbers of the islands. As a percentage of total government expenditure, spending on culture in 2023 ranged from 0,46 percent (Sint Maarten) and 0,95 percent (Aruba) to 1,28 percent (Saba), 1,95 percent (Bonaire), and 2,5 percent (Sint Eustatius).. These percentages lie between what the central government in the Netherlands spends on culture (0,4 percent) and what municipalities (3,2 percent) and provinces (6,5 percent) in the Netherlands spend (Government of Sint Maarten 2023, Public Body Bonaire 2024, Public Body Sint Eustatius 2024, Public Entity Saba 2024, Government of Aruba 2024).

Private contributions

Every year many citizens and companies support the Dutch cultural sector directly or indirectly through donations and funds. They do this through contributions to large and small private funds and foundations dedicated to culture in the Netherlands, but also through direct donations to creators or cultural organizations, bequests, crowdfunding or sponsorship, and lottery contributions. In total, through donations from citizens and businesses, 2022 certainly 389 million to the Dutch cultural sector.

From the biennial reports of Giving in the Netherlands it appears that the total private contributions to culture have been around 2015 million euros since 400. At the same time, the value of these donations is decreasing, because they do not increase with inflation. The equivalent of 400 million euros in 2015 is 2023 million euros in 512 after inflation correction. In fact, the real value of private contributions to culture has gradually and significantly decreased in recent years. 

All forms of giving by citizens and companies can be captured in the so-called giving pyramid. The idea behind this pyramid is that people first become connected to an institution in an accessible way. The more connected someone feels to an institution, the more inclined he or she is to give higher amounts (Johnson 2014).

Citizens also volunteer in all kinds of cultural areas. In 2022, according to the biennial Leisure Omnibus (VTO) One in ten Dutch people aged twelve and older are active as volunteers for a cultural organization. Although these contributions are difficult to express in monetary terms, it is clear that volunteers are of enormous value to cultural institutions and organizations (Lahaut 2025).

Own income

In addition to contributions from governments, individuals and companies, cultural organisations also generate their own income. Where subsidised sectors, such as performing arts, museums and libraries, were concerned, this amounted to Berenschot's custom work in 2023 at least 1,97 billion (Berenschot 2025). That is slightly less than a third of all cash flows that go to the subsidized sector. However, there are large income differences between cultural sectors and also in the possibilities for institutions and makers to generate their own income. For example, within the performing arts, there are more possibilities to generate substantial additional income through hall rental and catering than there are within the literary sector, for example. These are important caveats to this total amount and these percentage ratios. 

While own income still increased with inflation between 2015 and 2019, this has no longer been the case in recent years due to the impact of the corona pandemic and then the rising wage and energy costs and the sharp increase in inflation. Compared to eight years ago, inflation rose twice as fast as own income until 2023. This means that the real value of own income has decreased since 2015. 

When the own income from the private sectors, including architecture, games, cinemas, festivals, musicals and bookstores, is also included, the combined own income in 2023 amounted to at least 3,85 billion euros. This total amount is based on data on own income within the eight domains included in the Boekmanstichting Culture Monitor are included. It is made up of the income from the domains of performing arts (1,13 billion euros), architecture (1,05 billion euros), literature (812,7 million euros), audiovisual (350,3 million euros), visual arts (256,1 million euros) and heritage (256 million euros).

Below we will separately discuss the eight domains from the Culture Monitor and what is known about their own income within them.

What else do we want to know?

Government spending on culture has recently come under great pressure. In addition to plans by the Schoof cabinet, which will take office in 2024, to increase VAT on culture and to indirectly increase it through various measures, to cut government spending on culture, municipalities have been concerned for some time about the upcoming 'ravine year' of 2026. That year, municipalities will have to deal with sharply declining financial resources (Vinkenburg 2024). It is important to continue to monitor the impact of these policy choices and the consequences for the cultural sector.

In addition, after the summer of 2025, the Cultural Council will present advice on how the coordination between public and private funding can be better organised and what barriers governments, financiers and cultural institutions experience when attracting private money. Minister Bruins had asked the Council to advice requested on how public and private financiers can better collaborate to increase accessibility of financing and thus contribute to the financial stability of the sector. 

Certain cash flows and amounts have now been mapped out precisely, others are only approximate or are reasoned estimates. For other cash flows, we have only been able to gain a partial picture and there are still gaps. For example, we do have insight into the multi-year subsidies of the National Cultural Funds, but much less into the project subsidies. The ambition is to further fill these gaps in the future and to deepen the analyses of the various categories. 

We also want to gain more insight into the own income of more domains, both inside and outside the subsidized sectors. And we want to further map the financing mix within domains, in order to gain more insight into the relationships within different cultural sectors between government subsidies, private support and own income. 

It is also important to see if we can find out more about the income of cultural organizations for Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao, Saba, Sint Eustatius, and Sint Maarten. 

Want to know more about the theme of Culture and money flows?

View more data on the Culture and money flows theme in the Dashboard of the Culture Monitor. 

More literature on the topic of Culture and money flows can be found in the Knowledge base of the Boekman Foundation. 

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Characters  

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Editorial noteThe current version of this page was reviewed by Helleke van den Braber (Utrecht University). The previous version of this page, which is still partially present in the current page, was reviewed by Bastiaan Vinkenburg (Berenschot) and René Bekkers (VU, Giving in the Netherlands).

Graphics and design: Mathieu Stern (via Unsplash).