The Danish government is proposing a new measure that would have unemployed artists teach in schools.

Officials at the ministry of culture and education say artists, musicians, actors and filmmakers could teach instead of receiving unemployment benefits, according to an article in the Art Newspaper.

Denmark has the lowest unemployment rate in the European Union at 2.7 per cent.  However, graduates from Denmark's art schools are more likely to be jobless than other Danes.

According to 2006 statistics, an average of 11 per cent of those attending one of 16 Danish schools for the arts — including music, theatre and film — were without a job.

Statistics from the Royal Art Academy in Copenhagen show that drama graduates had the worst job prospects, with more than 17 per cent of former students unemployed.

The government says there's a chronic lack of teachers in Denmark and turning artists into teachers would solve two problems.

Art school administrators are not amused.

"We have always had an unemployment rate higher than average and if politicians want to employ arts graduates as teachers, they should do so. But they should not ask us to train students as teachers. That is not our task," responded Mikkel Bogh, director of the Royal Academy, which governs several different art schools across the country.