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Australia in danger of becoming an ‘artless country’ as enrolments in creative courses collapse
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 08 Feb 2026
29 points (91.4% liked)
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Being a starving artist living on the safety net is more difficult with cost of living increases.
Lots of music came from countries like England, Sweden, Australia which were reasonably wealthy and had some minimum level of social welfare. We lost affordable tertiary education and it is one less place for people to meet and form bands or experiment.
Young people looking at creative careers are seeing management everywhere turn to AI slop and looking elsewhere. Everyone is hoping to find work that can't be outsourced, can't be automated, has fair labour practices, won't put them in massive student debt and will still be around in 20 years. The choices seem to be narrowing.
Just one thing - student debt in Australia generally isn’t a problem like it is overseas. HECS/HELP repayments are a tiny percentage of your wage, and only kick in after you’re earning above a certain amount. Student debt would affect artists the least because the likely wouldn’t have to even repay it until they’re not struggling.