Re: Price discrimination for academic subscriptions (discussion)

["Anthony Watkinson" <anthony.watkinson@btopenworld.com>]

What David says is very fair. Let me rephrase. SPARC and others write that
the market is dysfunctional and that part of the dysfunctionality is that,
as end-users do not have to pay and demand that a title is subscribed to,
publishers can stick up prices as much as they wish because libraries have
to buy. It is my impression that most publishers do not decide now to take
advantage of this dysfunctionality. They fear being noticed by lists like
this one, which is all to the good.. This is not new. When I worked for
the Thomson Corporation for eleven years from 1988 and for most of that
time (not the last few years) was responsible for pricing Chapman & Hall
journals the corporate hierarchy was very worried about raising prices
more than the competition. The Thomson view was that retention of
subscribers was the main aim and the best policy. I should add that it is
my experience that pricing decisions are very complicated ones with a lot
of internal discussion and argument. Remember also that some commercial
publishers have to argue the case for price increases with learned
societies or even with editors who are on royalty arrangements. It is not
always the publishers who want to make the biggest increase. I think that
David's students are very lucky as long as he notes whether or not there
are more pages or issues being offered.

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Goodman" <David.Goodman@liu.edu>
To: <liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2003 11:35 PM
Subject: RE: Price discrimination for academic subscriptions (discussion)

> Some publishers are still known to try to increase their margins when they
> think they can succeed in doing so.
>
> In particular, the pattern of increase in prices for at least one large
> publisher certainly shows some elements of concern for what the market
> will bear: those journals whose prices are already at the highest levels
> are increased very little if at all, while the prices of the relatively
> few relatively inexpensive relatively popular titles are increased a much
> higher percentage. I do not say this is irrational behavior--it is very
> rational behavior--if the prices of the most expensive titles were
> increased 10 percent, there would certainly be major subscription loss.
>
> One can also see this by comparing different publishers. Some professional
> societies and other non-profit publishers consistently raise their prices
> a relatively large amount, with the explicit bare-faced explanation that
> they are even so a bargain as compared to the equivalent commercial
> publications.
>
> A basic exercise for librarians (and one that I show my students) is to
> keep a spreadsheet of prices from year to year, though the increasing
> reluctance of publishers to publish their prices and the increasing
> prevalence of bundling has made this somewhat more difficult. An outsider
> to the publishing industry can learn a lot by careful and skeptical
> reading and comparison of price lists, press releases, and statements to
> the stockholders or society members.
>
> Dr. David Goodman
> dgoodman@liu.edu