Band 9 model answer
As factories automate and heavy industry declines, attention has shifted to the so-called creative economy of design, film and music. I broadly agree that these industries now rival traditional manufacturing in their contribution to national prosperity, though they do not render it obsolete.
The economic weight of creativity is increasingly hard to dispute. Film studios, video-game developers and design agencies generate enormous revenues, employ millions and export cultural products that carry a nation's influence far beyond its borders. A single successful franchise or fashion house can earn more than an entire industrial sector, while the intellectual property it creates continues to yield income for decades. Such industries also tend to cluster in cities, regenerating urban areas and attracting skilled, mobile workers.
There are, admittedly, reasons for caution. Creative earnings can be volatile, depending on shifting tastes and unpredictable hits, whereas manufacturing supplies the steady, tangible goods on which daily life depends. A country cannot eat films or live in songs, and over-reliance on cultural exports could leave an economy exposed if fashions change. For this reason, dismissing traditional industry would be reckless.
On balance, however, I am persuaded that creativity has become a genuine engine of growth rather than a pleasant accessory to it. The most prosperous modern economies combine robust manufacturing with thriving creative sectors, recognising that ideas, images and innovation are valuable commodities in their own right. Rather than choosing between the two, nations should invest in both, since the future is likely to reward those who can produce not only goods but the imagination that gives those goods their meaning and appeal.
Examiner’s notes
- Task Response: the writer takes a clear 'broadly agree' stance, quantifies the creative sector's importance, fairly weighs the risk of volatility, and reaches a measured, well-supported conclusion.
- Coherence and Cohesion: balanced argumentation is signalled by 'admittedly', 'For this reason' and 'On balance, however', and the closing sentence echoes the introduction's 'render it obsolete' theme for unity.
- Lexical Resource: economic register is handled confidently, e.g. 'intellectual property', 'volatile', 'cluster in cities', and the phrase 'a pleasant accessory' adds nuance to the evaluation.