The Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society (ALCS), a UK-based membership organization for writers, has commissioned a study on author earnings conducted by Queen Mary, University of London. The report “The Business of Being an Author: A Survey of Author’s Earnings and Contracts” shows “incomes on the slide, but self publishing making an increasing contribution.” Research participants consisted of UK authors.
The survey was conducted from January to March 2014. Roughly 35,000 writers were asked to complete the survey. Respondents who started the survey totaled 2,454, while 1,477 completed it.
The report, released this month, is an update of a 2006 survey by the Centre of Intellectual Property Policy and Management at Bournemouth University in Dorset, England. The 2006 study looked into author earnings for financial year 2004-2005.
An executive summary of the 2015 report reveals these findings:
1. Author earnings have weakened over the last decade. Authors nowadays earn 19% less than what they used to in 2005. Professional authors who were referred to as spending “more than 50% of their working life engaged in self-employed writing” earn an average of £28,340, an 8-% drop since 2005.
2. Average earnings of all participating authors merely amount to £4,000, and professional authors, £11,000, a 29-% decline since 2005. These figures reveal that a professional author earns below the minimum wage.
3. Writers enjoy more earnings by the time they hit mid 40s to 50s. Female authors also earn 20% less than their male counterparts. This gap, however “has essentially disappeared in relation to writers as a whole group.”
4. 42% of authors will retain their copyright, while 12% never do so following publication.
5. Two-thirds of the respondents have been paid advances. However, the number of these authors and the amount have declined since 2006.
6. Publisher-author relationships have improved since 2006. Only 1 in 20 authors has had moral rights dispute with publisher.
7. A quarter of those surveyed had self-published, as self-publishing allows them to rekindle their past writing goals.
“… the most successful self-publishing ventures have an average rate of return of 154% (and a typical ‘median’ rate of return of 40%). It remains a risky venture, however, as the bottom 20% of self-publishers made losses of £400 or more.”
8. Respondents believe that their bargaining power has weakened over the last five years. Cumulative results of individual respondents suggest otherwise.
Download the complete ALCS report here.