French author earnings revealed in survey

The most extensive survey of authors' "economic and social conditions" ever conducted in France has shown that fewer than 10% of the estimated 101,600 authors in France earned most of their living from their work in 2013, the most recent year of available data. The vast majority had another professional activity and earned an average of only 12% of their income from royalties.

The survey, the result of five studies conducted by the French culture ministry, the National Book Centre (CNL), and two regional governmental bodies, was revealed this week, and also found that the income of the 10% of authors who earn most of their living from their work has declined. This is because the book market has stagnated or shrunk slightly in the past decade, the number of new titles has increased, and book prices have trailed inflation, the culture ministry said.

The snapshot of authors’ revenues in 2013 found that the median income of authors living mainly from their work was €22,000 net a year, 1.6 times the national minimum wage, the summary report said. But this means that about 40% of them earn below that, said Geoffroy Pelletier, director-general of the leading French writers union the Société des Gens de Lettres (SGDL). The national minimum wage now stands at €1,466.62 a month.

Moreover, the lack of information authors receive about the proceeds from their work is "catastrophic", Pelletier added during a three-way debate between authors’, publishers’ and booksellers’ representatives at the Paris Book Fair on Thursday (17th March).

Authors consider their pay too low, even though royalties paid by publishers have increased from 12% of their sales in 2000 to about 17% in 2014, the ministry said. This is because of a scissors effect between the increase in the number of titles published and the drop in sales for each of them, the report said.

The number of book authors registered with Agessa, the social security agency for authors, has tripled in the 35 years between 1979 and 2013, and the breakdown of the different players has changed. Writers have seen their share of the total fall from 75% to 47%, while illustrators have seen theirs rise from 14% to 31% and translators from 11% to 22%.