A poor analysis that excludes any talk of the production costs of different aspects of getting a book to market. Printing + labor in editing etc was 30% to 40%

A poor analysis that excludes any talk of the production costs of different aspects of getting a book to market. Printing + labor in editing etc was 30% to 40% of sticker price in 1960. Today it's 10 to 15 or lower while author royties are about the same. Retail channels like Amazon demand a higher cut but not enough to cover that gap. The net margin % of sticker paid by consumers above cost of production in all print and labor is paid by consumers, with the result that in raw dollars consumer still pay ~50% more than can be accounted for by inflation alone. Consider: as a portion of average income, a very large # of everyday factory produced items are substantially less expensive, some even in non-inflation adjusted terms! A TV? A fraction of the cost. Plenty more examples. Books are expensive.