Does K-Pop Boost The American Economy?

I’m not too sure how I came up with this question, but recently I have been exposed to K-Pop through some of my friends who described to me how popular it was. I think that caused me to wonder about the effects of K-Pop in the United States. Through the years, this genre has grown to be very popular, which can be seen by fans and people who aren’t fans. For example, BTS was the first ever K-Pop group to be nominated for a Grammy award, which is an award show that gives out awards based on popular music in the United States. This shows that K-Pop music is popular in America because they were awarded a nomination. As new music is produced and popularity grows, you can see more and more effects of K-Pop in the United States. So, my question is “Since K-Pop is becoming more popular, does the genre boost the American Economy?” Like how American music from artists like Taylor Swift and Beyoncé can boost the economy through their album sales and concerts, can K-Pop artists and tours do the same? Can creating merchandise based off of popular groups or artists allow room for profit? Can inspiration from the K-Pop genre allow similar music to be made by American artists and boost the economy? This is what I’ll be trying to answer. 

To establish a baseline, can music boost a country’s economy? The easy answer is yes. From creating new jobs, tourism, and contributing to a country’s GDP, music can allow for growth to a country’s economy. When music industries grow, new jobs are created for different positions needed in the music scene. Some jobs could include producers who make the beats for artists, managers who help upcoming artists establish themselves in the music scene, and entrepreneurs to start up different record labels and companies. A report from 2013 discovered in Nashville had developed and maintained over 56,000 jobs in the music industry, which overall boosted their economy. Local communities experience financial growth when artists come to town because many people rent hotel rooms and dine at local restaurants. This means that the music industry also increases the hotels’ revenue, increases restaurants’ profit, increases transportation use, and nearby local shops’ profit. For example, if a major artist were to come to a bigger city and a small business begin to produce their own creation of merchandise or fan apparel, that would benefit the shop and boost profit because many people would be coming to the city for the concert and be exposed to the small business there. The people exposed to the shop may also come back to the shops because they liked their products a lot, which created more popularity for the store. Additionally, the music industry does contribute to a city's and a country’s economic growth. According to Economists Inc., the music industry contributes over $170 billion annually to the U.S. GDP, which is gross domestic product (a measure of the U.S. economic activity). People buy concert tickets, spend money on CDs and Vinyl, and buy merchandise from their favorite artists’ websites. This all creates consumer spending, which in return grows the economy. 

Now that we have established that music can boost the American economy, can K-Pop do the same? I mean, K-Pop artists tour in the United States, bringing in thousands of fans from all over the country. Many local brands and small businesses create merchandise inspired by different groups and artists, or even individual songs they like. Many department stores and record shops sell CDs or Vinyl variants of K-Pop albums that have become extremely popular, making profit as they do it. So, in reality K-Pop can boost the American economy, but let’s look at the specifics of each category.

Of course, with the exchange of music, there is a cultural exchange between the United States and, more commonly, South Korea. One of the most popular exchanges between the two countries would be collaborations. For example, American Artist Megan Thee Stallion has collaborated with BTS on a remix of the song “Butter”, and American Artist Selena Gomez has collaborated with BLACKPINK on the song “Ice Cream”. These collaborations fuel songs with different languages in one, as well as the blend of different styles of music. Transcultural Interactions are developed since K-pop can be enjoyed by anyone, no matter if you know the language or not. With or without collaborations with english-speaking artists, people from various backgrounds can enjoy the music and can connect with others who enjoy the music as well. This causes the K-Pop genre to grow in popularity, causing interest in Korean culture and language to grow as well. Cross-communication through the lyrics and music videos develop a desire to understand the language and possibly why the music videos are different from American ones. If someone wants to know what different groups or artists are saying they will learn the language, which causes interest in Korean culture to increase. As well, the Global Fascination with Korean culture increases as more and more people learn about K-pop. This in return grows the fascination of cultural food, practices, and lifestyle. Overall, when more people enjoy K-Pop music, they often try to learn the culture of those they like. This increases the popularity of Korean culture, often increasing the popularity of different dishes and clothing that can be made or sold in America. Fascination also increases the popularity of the language, making it where more people, outside of Korea, speak Korean. 

Another factor to consider is that fans will buy products that connect to their favorite group or artist and attend concerts in the states they live in. Concerts bring in revenue for the cities that host them. Whether it’s a multi-award-winning artist or an underground group, fans will travel to the cities and, most likely, spend large sums of money on food, hotels, transportation and other necessities. Some fans will even travel out of their own state to go to an event in another state, and spend multiple days to partake in the event. It’s established that concerts will bring revenue to the businesses that surround where the concert is taking place. According to Hindustan Times, The BORN PINK tour by the K-Pop girl group BLACKPINK grossed over $11 million at the Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, Nevada. The tickets at that show for Las Vegas roughly started around $124. If you assume that they only grossed 11 million through ticket sales, there were roughly 88,710 people who attended that concert, which is over capacity. No matter if there were that many people attending that concert, those people still needed places to stay, places to eat, and ways to get to the stadium. This shows that concerts do boost the local areas that they take place. Also, companies will always follow what’s popular, no matter if they are a clothing brand, an online store, general store, or beauty store. So, if K-Pop is becoming huge, companies will follow the trend and start to create products that these fans will buy. According to Hindustan Times, a survey amongst American K-Pop fans found that they will spend $24 a month, on average, on merchandise. That’s roughly $288 a year. This survey shows that fans are willing to devote money to their interests, and companies will profit off of that. According to Disk Makers Blog, they suggest that there is a 40% to 60% profit margin for vinyl records. If that’s roughly the same for CDs, there is huge room for retailers to make profit off of the K-Pop vinyl and CDs they sell. A BTS vinyl on average is being sold for $35. That means that a retailer can most likely make anywhere from $14 to $21 on each vinyl sold. In other words, companies have room to make millions off of selling K-Pop merchandise, and the fans are willing to buy it all. 

Additionally, more people are starting to get into the genre, so American artists may make more music that sounds similar for Americans who don’t enjoy listening to music in a different language. We already established that the music industry helps a country’s country, so if many American Artists get inspired by the K-Pop genre, whether it’s the lyrics or the instrumentals, they will create new music. That new music will then help the American Economy by creating new jobs and new profit to be made from tours, merchandise, and records. There has been a demand from American listeners to find and create music that sounds very similar. I believe the closest we have gotten to a Western K-Pop like group is KATSEYE. They are a girl group based out of Los Angeles, California, but they were created through collaboration of the Korean Record Label Hybe and Geffen Records. The group follows K-Pop themes and similar music, but they are not technically K-Pop. Still, their music is fun, and sounds similar to some girl group K-pop music (other than the fact it’s in english). I think it would be great for upcoming artists who are inspired to make music now, because who knows how long American listeners will like K-pop and want music like it. Will it just become an old trend later? Will the interest actually stick around in 50 years? These are questions I’m wondering, and maybe it’s why many in the American music industry are staying away from the idea. 

To wrap this up, I believe that K-Pop does benefit and boost the American Economy through cultural exchange, merchandise sales, tours, and new inspiration for music. Collaborations between popular K-Pop artists and groups grow the music industry, and bring back profit for the American economy. The fascination for Korean culture has grown since the rise of K-Pop in America, and it can help boost local Korean shops in America as well as bring profit to stores that sell K-Pop inspired merchandise. Tours by K-Pop groups and solo artists will bring in revenue for the towns that host the concert by the fans buying hotel rooms, multiple people ordering food to eat before the concert from local restaurants, and fans using transportation, since many many have to buy an Uber or a bus pass. Fans will buy almost any merchandise that they enjoy, so there is much profit that companies can make from collaborations with artists. CD and Vinyl variants will create profit for the production and companies that sell them, since there are many collectors out there. Inspiration from the genre can cause Western artists to make music for the American audience that sounds similar to K-Pop. All of these reasons support the idea that K-Pop supports the American economy, and it’s creating revenue for it. Now, these are all of my ideas. Some of them are supported but not all of my inferences are for sure. Some of these ideas do support, while others are based on how the American music industry. No matter if they all are supported, I believe that they are all true. Now if you excuse me, I’ll be listening to “Work” by ATEEZ!

***I do not own the rights to this photo!! This was taken from Teen Vogue's Article about BLACKPINK performing at Coachella!