According to news from the British "Guardian" and other media, recently, a research report released by the "British Writers Association" has sparked heated discussions.

According to the research, the median income of full-time authors in the UK in 2022 is only £7,000. This figure once again brings the sustainability crisis of the writing industry into the public eye. The increasingly harsh living conditions may affect the career choices of latecomers.

This study was specifically carried out by the Center for Copyright and Creative Economy Research (CREATE) at the University of Glasgow, UK. "Full-time authors" are those who spend more than 50% of their working time on writing, including book authors, journalists, and screenwriters. and other text workers.

Although the scope delineation has been as loose as possible, the situation is still not optimistic. Compared with the 2018 survey results, the median annual income has dropped by 33%. Nicola Solomon, executive director of the British Writers Association, regretted that the income of 7,000 pounds meant that they could not even guarantee their basic survival needs.

"While our interviewees all talked about a love of creating itself, it's becoming increasingly difficult to make a living out of love alone," added Amy Thomas, lead researcher on the team. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, the ongoing cost of living crisis has spread in the UK.

Still, the results are disappointing, calling into question the sustainability of the UK writing industry and, more importantly, revealing an era in which "the value of creative labor is shrinking".

British author Theresa Talbot has published four books, but she still can't make a living from selling books alone. When she isn't writing, she also runs a small storefront.

"It usually takes a year to write a book, and you may not have any income during this year. After all, writing is an industry with a very low barrier to entry, but it is actually very difficult to make money from it. Those who are very successful writers, there are big publishers behind them. But they won't publish your book."

The survey confirms that some writers have seen the sharpest declines. Among them, between 2017 and 2020, the actual income of female authors fell by 21%, while the income of male authors fell by only 10%. But the researchers say it could also be related to male respondents' shyness about revealing negative experiences and their preference to maintain a positive image.

Compared with the deterioration of the overall environment, the internal problems in the field of writing mentioned by Talbot are indeed more serious. The top 10 percent of authors earn about 47 percent of the group's total income, and many authors have to rely on "other family members with higher incomes."

Thomas worries that inequalities in internal income could also affect the diversity of writing, which would be disastrous for the cultural market as a whole. Will the profession of writing develop into "the preserve of the privileged few"?

It is worth noting that the report sounded the alarm for the entire British publishing industry. "Authors are at the heart of our industry and their work deserves a fair return," said Dan Conway, chief executive of the Association of British Publishers, although publishers' payments to authors have risen in recent years. But "more fairness" is also needed.

The report also shows that many authors have a relatively weak awareness of copyright. Almost half of the authors have never even received an advance payment, but they have not tried to defend their rights.