Taylor Swift is ‘walking GDP’: Shanghai urged to shake off curbs on foreign stars

Government advisers in China’s financial hub call to relax regulations around international acts to cash in on top-level shows

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Global pop sensation Taylor Swift’s record-breaking Eras Tour shows the economic benefits of hosting such top-level performers, Shanghai government counsellors have said. Photo: AFP

Published: 3:00pm, 19 Jul 2024Updated: 4:44pm, 19 Jul 2024

Advisers to the Shanghai government have called for restrictions on international performers to be relaxed, while likening superstars like Taylor Swift to “walking GDP”.

China’s financial hub has hosted many large-scale, commercial performances in recent years, but “it lacks stars that are weighty, internationally influential or truly appealing to young people”, the counsellors’ office of the Shanghai municipal government said in an article posted on its official WeChat account.

Attracting a better range of high-quality performances would help Shanghai to lure both domestic and international audiences, counsellors Li An, Gu Honghui and Zhang Wenyi wrote in the article.

Swift’s record-breaking Eras Tour showed the economic benefits of hosting such top-level performers, they said.

“This is the largest and highest-grossing personal concert tour in history, having generated over US$5 billion in consumer spending so far. It is literally a ‘walking GDP’,” the counsellors wrote.

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They suggested drawing inspiration from Singapore and Japan’s performance models, warning that Shanghai’s existing regulations around international performances were limiting the potential to attract top-tier talent.