According to Charles Bailey, Elsevier is keeping its 2009 price increases to less than 6%, below what Elsevier claims is the industry average of 8.7% in Europe and over 10% in the U.S. Revenue from author payments is cited as one of the reasons for this moderation.
Congratulations to Elsevier for taking a step in the right direction.
The Consumer Price Index in Canada is currently 2.2% - an increase from recent months due to dramatically rising gas prices. This being the case, even without accounting for a new revenue source (author fees), a 6% increase is not modest at all, but rather very inflationary.
Think about the impact of compounding; annual price increases of 6% amount to much more over a few years. By the third year, prices have increased 20%; by the fifth year, prices have increased by 33%.
Interesting, this is the maximum increase. If some Elsevier journals are charging less than the maximum, or the average increase is less, now that would be very interesting!
Thanks to Gavin Baker on Open Access News.
