US rage at textbook price hike

The spiralling cost of university textbooks since multinational companies gained near-monopolies on the business has begun to anger not only students and their parents but also state legislatures and the US Congress.

Lawmakers are asking why identical textbooks cost substantially more in the US than in the UK and elsewhere, and whether publishers frequently issue new editions to prevent students from buying books second-hand.

"The price of textbooks has skyrocketed, and the pace of publishing unnecessary new editions has speeded up," said Dave Rosenfeld, co-ordinator of the Student Public Interest Research Group's (PIRG) Campaign for Affordable Textbooks.

Congress, which underwrites student aid to pay for tuition fees, has asked for an investigation. Legislatures in nearly 20 of the 50 states have passed or are considering Bills designed to lower textbook prices. And student governments on 24 campuses have passed resolutions demanding a reduction in the cost of textbooks.

But there is little that can be done to compel publishers to lower their prices. Most legislation uses words such as "encourage" and "where possible".

The textbook publishing industry is dominated by three firms: Pearson, the Canadian company Thomson Learning and New York-based McGraw Hill. Two smaller companies, W. H. Freeman and John Wiley & Sons, also produce textbooks for the US.

"There's no competition in the industry any more," Mr Rosenfeld said. "The textbook market is set up in such a way that it allows publishers to get away with things that if it were any other market wouldn't be allowed."

US students spend about $900 a year (£476) on textbooks, according to a survey of ten campuses on the West Coast.

The General Accounting Office found that prices had increased by twice the rate of inflation in the past two decades, but by four times the rate of inflation in the past ten years. The National Association of College Bookstores said textbooks prices had gone up 40 per cent in the past five years.

While students can save on average 45 per cent on a textbook by buying it second-hand, publishers thwart this practice by frequently releasing new editions - and increasing the price by an average of 12 per cent on the previous version. The most frequently assigned textbooks are reissued, on average, every three years.

One reason for the rising cost is that half of all textbooks now come with instructional materials including CD-Roms and workbooks, the PIRG reports.

Publishers say these materials are in high demand. Yet in a survey, 65 per cent of faculty said they rarely included the ancillary materials in their courses.

Identical textbooks cost, on average, 20 per cent more in the US than in the UK, according to the PIRG. A Pearson calculus textbook that costs $100 in the US sells for $38 in the UK. A Freeman Learning chemical textbook costs twice as much. Thomson Learning charges 72 per cent more in the US than in the UK.