Why are textbooks so expensive?

[nibot]

To: Editors, Academic Press
Subj: Why are books so expensive?

I've recently been wondering what it is that makes mathematics textbooks so expensive. For example, Enderton's book Elements of Set Theory, far from the most egregious example, costs more than $100 in our campus book store. It can't be printing an d distribution alone that account for this enormous cost -- similarly sized books often cost less than $20. The typesetting is more complex than books in many other fields (such as those books that contain only prose) yet even this must have been paid for long ago -- the book was originally published in 1977. I wonder if you could estimate, for my own curiosity, how much of the $100 textbook cost goes to the reseller, how much goes for distribution, how much for the direct publication costs, what percent goes to the author as royalty, etc.

thank you,
Tobin Fricke

EDIT: They responded!

Comments

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

I'd love to see the response, if you get one!

[emidala.livejournal.com]

Böcker borde vara nästan gratis. Författaren borde få sin beskärda del, definitivt, och likaså bokförläggaren och förlaget. Återförsäljarna däremot, som åtminstone i Sverige lägger till minst 200%, borde skämmas. Jag älskar böcker men jag avskyr att köpa dem. Så borde det inte vara.

[nibot.livejournal.com]

Books are so incredibly, ridiculously expensive in Sweden. That was one of my bits of advice to those students who came after me: you can buy everything in Sweden except your textbooks; buy those at home. I'm thinking of carting a suitcase of paperbacks to Geneva with me as a donation to the CERN library. Moe's Books on Telegraph is a wonderful, wonderful place.

[easwaran.livejournal.com]

I believe academic books are substantially more expensive than non-academic books mainly because of the smaller numbers involved. When each book sells a million copies, you can afford to make only 10 cents on each book, but if there are only a couple thousand copies in circulation, then all the fixed costs require more markup on each individual book.

Of course, this doesn't explain the whole phenomenon. In market terms, I think the demand curve for academic books is less elastic than the curve for non-academic books, as there's often no competition. I mean, what other book would you get if you thought Enderton was too expensive? And because I can't find a copy of Kunen's Set Theory anywhere (even from the publisher) someone thinks it's plausible to sell a used copy for $120, when the original only cost $60!

[nibot.livejournal.com]

That's how the theory usually goes, but I don't really believe it. One would think that the fixed costs of a decently successful book would be covered after being in print for a quarter century. I can manually photocopy Enderton's book (which I intend to do, actually) for less than $7. I wonder what the per-book royalty to an author is... If you have any math prof associates who've published books, can you ask them?

[(Anonymous)]

Part of the problem is that instructors want to at least appear to be giving their students the very latest in information. So you have to read this year's latest research. While it is questionable whether one has to read this year's edition of the Greek classics, no serious molecular biologist wants a ten year old copy of "The Immune System and How it Works". So it's not just a small market, it's a brief market--then it is all obsolete and tossed out.
'Course it's probably obsolete by the time it hits print anyway...

[stahrreenite.livejournal.com]

Semi irrelevant, maybe... I have copy of Enderton's book I'm not using if you would like to borrow it for a semester.

[nibot.livejournal.com]

Yse, that might be nice.. although, for now I have the library copy to tide me over. I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on Math 135 vs. Math 142.

Re:

[stahrreenite.livejournal.com]

I didn't take 142. I took 140 and 141, though. 141 being the first, one might say "too-ballsy" route (friends at the time were in 214 as well and said that 214 was easier... 141 was taught by knutson), and 140 being the just get the geometry out of the way. i started in 135, and just couldn't take the teacher (or the material) seriously. rather than ruin my grades, i bailed midway. i HATE set theory. topology is beautiful.