4 ms·

Assumption 1: the primary customers of increasingly expensive subscriptions from academic publishers are universities. Assumption 2: the cost of the subscripti

by wsfull 10y ago

Assumption 1: the primary customers of increasingly expensive subscriptions from academic publishers are universities. Assumption 2: the cost of the subscriptions is passed on to the primary customers of the universities -- students. Assumption 3: assumptions 1 and 2 are correct. Question: Is there any correlation to be made between the profitability of such academic publishers with the astounding rise in university tuition in the US over the past three decades?

shkkmo 10y ago
Presumably some, but from what I read, much of the increase in tuition it tied to increases in administration costs.
anon4 10y ago
Probably, but I expect it would account for less than 0.5% of the increase. The costs of everything is passed on to the students (minus the relatively constant government subsidy, if any).
Freak_NL 10y ago
Assumption two seems dubious, because universities in the rest of the world pay for the same subscriptions, but don't pass these costs on to their students. It may be true for the US though.
ommunist 10y ago
WHo cares about the US? The collective knowledge of humanity is at stake. The keepers are restless, believe me. And most of them do not even speak English.
csydas 10y ago
As much as it is a broken system, in this case likely no. The actual subscriptions are cost prohibitive pretty much just to individuals and to organizations outside western Academia. The distinction of "western" is only relevant in that from what I recall working with Librarians at my last University job, the publishers do business differently with the US and parts of EU than they do elsewhere in the world. Rising tuition costs are an issue, but in relation to an academic budget, journal subscriptions will still account for a very small percent of the overall budget, even for relatively small University. The Publisher/University subscription loop, however, is indeed real and has been covered here before I believe. The short of it is that quite a few publishers are basically held together by taxpayer money in the form of continued library subscriptions. The need for a middleman in these cases is pretty questionable, as the publishers basically just host the content at this point and do no curation or peer review themselves.
jccalhoun 10y ago
While the cost for access to databases is quite high, it probably only a few dollars per student at most.
- shubb 10y ago
  Which is interesting in itself, because it means that they could offer affordable personal subscriptions without losing money. So in fact huge journal subscription fees becomes a way to trap academic research in these institutions, rather than just journal greediness.
privong 10y ago
> Assumption 2: the cost of the subscriptions is passed on to the primary customers of the universities -- students. This is not likely to be true. Most universities in the US take overheads on grants. So if you get a $20,000 grant, the university will often take up to $12,000 of that (usually it's in the $6000–8000 range), and the researcher uses the rest. That money in overheads is used for a variety of things, including supporting the research (i.e., paying for journal subscriptions). > Question: Is there any correlation to be made between the profitability of such academic publishers with the astounding rise in university tuition in the US over the past three decades? Journals are expensive, but they're not _that_ expensive. It's much more plausible that the rise in tuition can be linked to non-academic expenditures at universities, including athletic facilities (e.g., gyms for students), fancy dining halls and dorms, and non-academic staff. Maybe one could argue those aren't the drivers of high tuition, but I'd be surprised if a rise in journal costs were remotely comparable.
- nullc 10y ago
  > Journals are expensive, but they're not _that_ expensive. https://mako.cc/fun/overpricetags/ https://mako.cc/fun/overpricetags/ Would $25,888/yr for a single journal not count as '_that_ expensive'? But I agree they're not likely a tuition driver. After all, institutions can simply drop subscriptions: they don't do much for attracting students compared to facilities.
  - privong 10y ago
    > Would $25,888/yr for a single journal not count as '_that_ expensive'? For a journal cost, $25,888/yr is expensive, but no, it wouldn't count as "_that_ expensive". I meant "_that_ expensive" as "expensive enough to be a tuition driver".

by wsfull 10y ago

shkkmo 10y ago

Presumably some, but from what I read, much of the increase in tuition it tied to increases in administration costs.

anon4 10y ago

Probably, but I expect it would account for less than 0.5% of the increase. The costs of everything is passed on to the students (minus the relatively constant government subsidy, if any).

Freak_NL 10y ago

Assumption two seems dubious, because universities in the rest of the world pay for the same subscriptions, but don't pass these costs on to their students. It may be true for the US though.

ommunist 10y ago

WHo cares about the US? The collective knowledge of humanity is at stake. The keepers are restless, believe me. And most of them do not even speak English.

csydas 10y ago

As much as it is a broken system, in this case likely no. The actual subscriptions are cost prohibitive pretty much just to individuals and to organizations outside western Academia. The distinction of "western" is only relevant in that from what I recall working with Librarians at my last University job, the publishers do business differently with the US and parts of EU than they do elsewhere in the world. Rising tuition costs are an issue, but in relation to an academic budget, journal subscriptions will still account for a very small percent of the overall budget, even for relatively small University. The Publisher/University subscription loop, however, is indeed real and has been covered here before I believe. The short of it is that quite a few publishers are basically held together by taxpayer money in the form of continued library subscriptions. The need for a middleman in these cases is pretty questionable, as the publishers basically just host the content at this point and do no curation or peer review themselves.

jccalhoun 10y ago

While the cost for access to databases is quite high, it probably only a few dollars per student at most.

shubb 10y ago
Which is interesting in itself, because it means that they could offer affordable personal subscriptions without losing money. So in fact huge journal subscription fees becomes a way to trap academic research in these institutions, rather than just journal greediness.

privong 10y ago

> Assumption 2: the cost of the subscriptions is passed on to the primary customers of the universities -- students. This is not likely to be true. Most universities in the US take overheads on grants. So if you get a $20,000 grant, the university will often take up to $12,000 of that (usually it's in the $6000–8000 range), and the researcher uses the rest. That money in overheads is used for a variety of things, including supporting the research (i.e., paying for journal subscriptions). > Question: Is there any correlation to be made between the profitability of such academic publishers with the astounding rise in university tuition in the US over the past three decades? Journals are expensive, but they're not _that_ expensive. It's much more plausible that the rise in tuition can be linked to non-academic expenditures at universities, including athletic facilities (e.g., gyms for students), fancy dining halls and dorms, and non-academic staff. Maybe one could argue those aren't the drivers of high tuition, but I'd be surprised if a rise in journal costs were remotely comparable.

nullc 10y ago
> Journals are expensive, but they're not _that_ expensive. https://mako.cc/fun/overpricetags/ https://mako.cc/fun/overpricetags/ Would $25,888/yr for a single journal not count as '_that_ expensive'? But I agree they're not likely a tuition driver. After all, institutions can simply drop subscriptions: they don't do much for attracting students compared to facilities.
- privong 10y ago
  > Would $25,888/yr for a single journal not count as '_that_ expensive'? For a journal cost, $25,888/yr is expensive, but no, it wouldn't count as "_that_ expensive". I meant "_that_ expensive" as "expensive enough to be a tuition driver".