ASA 2023 survey results: Earnings ‘perilously low’, rising royalty agreements increase
The 2023 Australian Society of Authors (ASA) survey of members has found ‘a trend towards authors being paid a rising royalty in their publishing agreements’, with 40% of respondents indicating their agreements included rising royalties, up 4% on last year.
However, ‘authors and illustrators are still reporting perilously low earnings,’ said the ASA.
The majority (55%) of full-time authors that responded to the survey earned less than $15,000 in the last financial year, with 23% of the full-time author respondents reporting earnings between $0 and $1999. Overall, 52% of respondents earned between $0 and $1999 from their creative practice in the last financial year, with the overwhelming majority (80%) earning less than $15,000, in a result that the ASA said is on par with results from previous surveys.
The survey also found 32% of authors received no advance, and almost 70% reported an advance of under $5000. Even with low advances, only 59% of authors reported earning out their advance.
The ASA this year introduced a question to the survey about audiobook sales, finding that, in the last financial year, most respondents (68%) did not earn any audiobook royalties and only 1.92% indicated that over 25% of their royalty income was attributable to audiobook sales, with these respondents predominantly working in genre fiction and nonfiction.
Finally, the survey found only 15.42% of respondents had an agent. Of that proportion, 74% have an agent based in Australia, 15% have one based overseas, and 11% have agents both in Australia and overseas.
The full ASA report on the 2023 survey can be found on the ASA website here.
Category: Local news
