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The Times has published a posthumous article based on the work of the late, great Alan Krueger on one of his side interests: the economics of the music business. And it is, of course, great. But the premise may not be right! 1/ nytimes.com/2019/06/01/opi…
Krueger used Rihanna as an example of how modern media allow superstars to earn far more than they could from live performances. And he cites the Victorian economist Alfred Marshal on the limits faced by past artists, like Mrs. Billington of the London opera 2/
Mrs. Billington, we're told, was paid 10,000 pounds for a season. How should we think of that? Well, the Bank of England has a great historical database, which tells us that per capita GDP in Great Britain was around 30 pounds at the time 3/ bankofengland.co.uk/statistics/res…
So Mrs. Billington earned around 300 times per capita GDP. Meanwhile, Billboard tells us that in 2016 Rihanna earned $22.3 million 4/ billboard.com/photos/7865108…
That was a bit over 350 times U.S. GDP per capita in that year. So to a first approximation Rihanna and Mr.s Billington actually earned about the same amount relative to their societal norms! 5/ fred.stlouisfed.org/series/A939RC0…
And as best I can make out, Jenny Lind, the "Swedish nightingale", was paid about as much per performance relative to prevailing incomes as today's superstars 6/ americanhistory.si.edu/blog/jenny-lind
So the funny thing is that technology seems to have had much *less* impact on superstar earnings, at least in music, than you might have expected 7/
