Some people don't even realize that researchers themselves pay money to publish a scientific manuscript, whether closed or open, and not the other way around. S

Some people don't even realize that researchers themselves pay money to publish a scientific manuscript, whether closed or open, and not the other way around. So the publishing house (likely) recoups their costs of editing and publication with the publication fee paid by the scientist. Remember peer reviewers are not paid either; editing staff, typesetters etc. are the ones that do get paid. So my issue with the pay for open access model is researchers have to use their grant money to pay even more to these publishers just to unlock the articles for anyone to download. It doesn't solve the underlying problem but rather just throws fuel on the fire of publishers and their mighty monopoly. They are for-profit entities. A truly effective mandate to shift the paradigm of publishing would be to mandate publication in completely open access journals, not ones that allow it only with an extra fee. Then more and more scientists would shift to these journals inherently raising the influence of completely open access journals.