An Estimation of the Contribution of the International Meeting Industry to the Korean National Economy Based on Input—Output Analysis

This paper presents the contribution of the international meeting industry to the Korean national economy. To obtain more accurate results, the study adopted three improvements over previous research: consideration of both supply and demand; direct expenditure surveys of participants and hosts; and re-categorization of related business sectors. The results of the input-output analysis showed that per capita expenditure for international and domestic participants was US$2,432.4 and US$459.3, respectively, and the per capita average budget was US$562.1. Based on these findings, the total contribution of the international meeting industry to the Korean economy exceeds US$1,343.2 million in output, US$236.6 million in personal income, US$589.3 million in value added, US$61.5 million in tax revenue and 16,336 full-time-equivalent jobs. These results provide two key implications, providing evidence of the importance of both the supply and demand sides and the relative importance of each sub-industry for increasing economic benefit.