The Creativity Premium

Arbeitspapier

Success in life increasingly depends on key skills that allow people to thrive in education, the labor market, and their interactions with others. In this paper, we emphasize creativity as a key skill that is essential to open-ended problem solving and resistant to automation. We use rich longitudinal data to study the relationship between people's creativity measured in childhood and their individual attributes and life outcomes. We find that childhood creativity predicts labor market and educational success: more creative individuals earn more during the course of their careers, work in higher occupational categories, and reach higher levels of educational attainment. Our analysis of attributes further suggests that creative individuals have a package of practical skills that allows them to thrive in work environments where learning from experience is important. We combine insights from our findings with evidence from psychology to propose creativity-improving interventions that could lead to substantial economic benefits.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: IZA Discussion Papers ; No. 14421

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Micro-Based Behavioral Economics: Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making‡ ; Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
• Subject: creativity ; skills ; life outcomes ; children ; longitudinal ; labor market ; wages ; earnings ; occupational category ; educational attainment ; practical skills ; experience ; cognitive ability ; human capital

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Gill, David ; Prowse, Victoria L.
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
• (where): Bonn
• (when): 2021

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/236452
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:45 AM CET