Among other incentives(genre that combines mortality salience and people’s enthusiasm for plucky survivors?); one might argue that the apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic genres were recipients of one of the largest programs of government funding for the arts; certainly since the glory days of theocratic monument and tomb construction, possibly period; I’m not sure how the GDP and cost numbers shake down.
This was unintentional; the money in question was allocated to various DoD bits and pieces during the Cold War; not the National Endowment for the Arts; but (at least for me) one of the things that really helps make the genre compelling is the fact that my not-very-distant predecessors poured substantial talent and staggering resources into building the real thing; a body of work that both stands pretty well on its own and inspired a solid body of commentary.
(By way of relatively obvious example; I’d like to have a better one; but this is the one that comes to mind because it is obvious: Doctor Strangelove is both good and given much more punch by the degree to which it mirrors On Thermonuclear War with some character development added.)
