[GOAL] Is the staggeringly profitable business of scientific publishing bad for science?

[Jean-Claude Guédon]

In LEARNED PUBLISHING. VOL . 1 5, N O. 4, OCTOBER 200 2, Brian Cox,
writing about Maxwell, offers the following story:
"In 1951, when Pergamon was founded, the US dollar had already replaced
sterling as the world currency and until the 1980s remained the
benchmark against which all other currencies were measured. Costs and
subscription rates grew as journals grew in size and
frequency, but were incurred in pounds during many years when the pound
fell in value against the dollar – a fact not immediately apparent to
librarians in the United States, who were pleased with Pergamon’s
apparently stable prices. The exchange illusion was a major factor in
Pergamon’s profitability." (p. 276).
Cox continues "When, after 40 years, the US dollar ceased to be the
benchmark for world currency, and the true costs and prices of STM
journals became apparent, Pergamon and other European journal
publishers fell abruptly in the esteem of the US library
market."
Between 1975 and 1985, the exchange rate between £ and $ started around
2.4£/$ to drop at 1.75 £/$ in early 1977 to climb back to nearly 2.5
around 1983 finally to decline slightly above par in early 1985.
(See https://www.poundsterlinglive.com/bank-of-england-spot/historical-
spot-exchange-rates/gbp/GBP-to-USD)
Likewise, the exchange rate between the Guilder and the dollar went
from 0.3957 in 1975 to 0.3024 in 1985 with a peak of 0.5033 in 1980.
There again, fluctuations went both ways.
(http://www.historicalstatistics.org/Currencyconverter.html)
The fluctuations in the exchange rate militate against the argument
that exchange rates consistently worked against (or for) US buyers.
What is more probable is that European commercial publishers, at least
some of them some of the time, used the dollar value when the European
currencies went down, thus creating the illusion of stability in their
prices (but increased profits in European currencies). When the dollar
decreased in value, they simply applied the current exchange rate. In
other words, they manipulated exchange rates to their advantage.
Cox, an employee of maxwell, obviously thought this was a nifty trick!
Too bad for ethics.
If this hypothesis can be documented, it may be another good example of
how commercial publishers view libraries and their budgets. Has anyone
kept old accounting records?
Jean-Claude Guédon
Le samedi 08 juillet 2017 à 12:32 -0700, Dana Roth a écrit :
> Very interesting article, although the author missed a couple of
> points ... namely that 
> 
> 1.Maxwell was very clever in providing 'personal subscriptions' to
> scientists at subscribing institutions at less than the cost of
> mailing.
> 
> 2. The 10% increase in price for Brain Research from 1975 to 1985 was
> due both to a 50% increase in the number of articles (1000 to 1500)
> but also to exchange rate changes.  The value of the US$ vs Dutch
> Guilder underwent some major fluctuations in those years.
> 
> 3.  Problems with exchange rate profiteering came later.
> 
> On Tue, Jun 27, 2017 at 4:35 AM, <barry.mahon at iol.ie> wrote:
> > Interesting, especially nostalgic. However, a good start re
> > Elsevier became the story of Maxwell. Pity
> > 
> > > Interesting article in the Guardian that spells out the role
> > > played by Robert Maxwell in the development of the scholarly
> > > journal industry. 
> > > 
> > > Éric
> > > 
> > > 
> > > Is the staggeringly profitable business of scientific publishing
> > > bad for science?
> > > https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jun/27/profitable-busine
> > > ss-scientific-publishing-bad-for-science?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
> > > 
> > > 
> > > Eric Archambault
> > > 1science.com
> > > Science-Metrix.com
> > > +1-514-495-6505 x111
> > > 
> > > 
> > > GOAL mailing list
> > > GOAL at eprints.org
> > > http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal
> > > 
> > _______________________________________________
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> > http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal
> > 
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