Author Earnings Sliding Fast in U.K.

This content has been archived. It may no longer be accurate or relevant.

From Publishers Weekly:

Median annual income of professional writers in the U.K. is now under £10,500, down by 15% since 2013, according to ALCS (Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society) research. That figure puts authors’ hourly rate well below minimum wage

The earnings figure of £10,500 compares to the figure of £17,900 defined last year by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation as the income level considered to be a socially acceptable standard of living for a single person.

. . . .

At £3,000 a year, the typical median earnings of ‘all writers’—which includes occasional and part-time writers in addition to professional writers as defined above—are also declining steeply, falling in real terms by 49% since 2005 and 33% since 2013.

As earnings have fallen, so have the number of full-time writers. In 2005, 40% of professional writers earned their income solely from writing. By last year, that figure had fallen to 13.7%. As writing earnings decline, most writers are following portfolio careers, supplementing their writing income with other activities such as teaching.

The findings in the U.K. are generally in line with the salary survey the Authors Guild did in 2015that found a steady decline in authors earnings between 2009 and 2015.

The fall in writer incomes comes against the backdrop of the expansion of the U.K.’s creative industries, now valued at £92 billion and growing at twice the rate of the rest of the U.K. economy.

The gender pay gap is widening, with the average earnings of female professional authors only about 75% of those of the average male professional writer, down slightly from 78% in 2005.

. . . .

At the Society of Authors, chief executive Nicola Solomon said: “This decline is extremely disturbing. With average earnings down by 42% in real terms since 2005 and now falling well below the minimum wage, it is worrying news for the profession.” She went on to say that “if authors can no longer afford to make a living from their work, the supply of new and innovative writing will simply dry up.”

Link to the rest at Publishers Weekly

17 thoughts on “Author Earnings Sliding Fast in U.K.”

  1. A question,

    How much of that decline is a consequence, not a precursor, of midlist writers leaving the industry in droves? If you have 1000£, 10000£ and 100000£ contracts and the middle layer disappears, the mean drops.

    Take care

  2. The headline seems to be incomplete.
    I suspect that what they mean is:

    TRADITIONALLY PUBLISHED AUTHOR EARNINGS SLIDING FAST IN UK.

  3. I think the real question is, how many of these potential full time authors are not making very much money because their books aren’t selling very well. It’s one thing to not make money because it all goes to the publisher. It’s another thing to not make money because people just don’t want to buy your stuff.

  4. I would like to see some numbers broken down; if the UK publishers report X amount of earnings last year, what percentage of that whole went to authors across the board? Same numbers for Amazon. I suspect the latter is a higher percentage. My uneducated guess for the large houses is somewhere around 3%.

  5. At the Society of Authors, chief executive Nicola Solomon said: “This decline is extremely disturbing. With average earnings down by 42% in real terms since 2005 and now falling well below the minimum wage, it is worrying news for the profession.” She went on to say that “if authors can no longer afford to make a living from their work, the supply of new and innovative writing will simply dry up.

    Can we all just take a second to laugh at this? As if new writers aren’t working a job while writing (and waiting for the trad pub house to actually publish it). Because only new and innovative writing comes from people who work at it full-time right? There’s a few slush piles that would say otherwise.

    • Oh, I think some famous writers of the past have a thing to say about the possibility of writing while doing day jobs:

      https://www.inc.com/glenn-leibowitz/want-to-get-famous-pursuing-your-passion-these-7-people-prove-you-dont-need-to-quit-your-day-job.html

      And most of my writer friends have day jobs as teachers, ghostwriters, personal assistants, technical writers, baristas, freelance editors, programmers, martial arts instuctors, retail clerks and managers, publicists, website designers, and military service, among others. One’s a full-time missionary in a foreign country, and yet finds time to write.

      Writers determined to write will find a way to write, even if it’s an hour in the morning before hustling to a job. Didn’t Scott Turow write his breakout hit while commuting on a train back and forth to his work as a lawyer?

  6. Pay more and the median could stay the same or fall. Higher pay will attract more authors and books. There are no barriers to entry.

  7. A traditionally published author has to clear a significant sales hurdle in their home-country market before their publisher puts any effort into foreign rights sales.

    An indie can put their book on sale internationally from day 1.

    This has big implications for the UK, which has only a fifth as many readers as the US market.

    It means that at launch UK indie books can reach a combined audience 6X the size of the UK’s home market, which is the pond traditional UK authors are otherwise stuck in, until they “break out.”

    Is it any wonder traditionally published UK writers are sucking wind?

    The UK indies, OTOH, whose sales aren’t restricted geographically and can reach 6X the customers their trad brethren can, are doing just fine.

Comments are closed.