Why do textbooks cost so much?

[dennis thompson]

I just bought a textbook for an introductory business course my grandson is taking in his first year in college, cost was $170:eek:
Why do textbooks cost so much?
Dennis

[Ted Calver]

Cause they gotcha right where they want ya:)

[Matt Meiser]

Why is the sky blue and the grass green? :D

Wait till he goes to sell it back used and they offer $3.18. So they can sell it used for $169.34.

[Brian Kerley]

Because they can.

They have an audience that is forced to buy a book. Therefore, they can charge whatever they want.

Not to mention that with student loans and such, it all gets thrown into the loan. So if a kid isn't having to bear the cost right now, it's hard for them to complain. Hell, federally backed student loans is one big contributor to why college expenses have risen so highly to begin with.

[Stew Hagerty]

Because they can. They have an audience that is forced to buy a book. Therefore, they can charge whatever they want.

Bingo... +1 that

[Rod Sheridan]

A text book is often a low volume book that has a short lifespan as the content material changes.

In addition, they often require expert level knowledge, experience and education.

All of the above cause the book to be expensive, per unit...............Regards, Rod.

[Brian Elfert]

I believe the reason textbooks have regular new editions is not because the material changes that often. I think the real reason is so students have to buy new textbooks from the publisher and the used ones lose all value.

[Bryan Slimp]

There is really no reason why they shouldn't go all digital.

Also, some text books can be rented. Maybe an avenue to check into in the future.

[Dan Friedrichs]

As Rod said, they're usually VERY low volume (compared to, say, a mass-market paperback), they are usually VERY intensive to write (consider the effort needed to make the thousands of figures in a typical textbook, versus just writing text), they need to be written by experts, and the proofreading is tremendously onerous. And, the material does change (or, at the very least, people come up with better ways to present it).

There is no boogeyman, here - college bookstores are typically subsidized by the school (they make very little money on textbook sales), authors make peanuts (and typically only write a book because they're frustrated by the lack of other quality offerings in the field), and publishers have to deal with the fickle market for such specialized books.

[David Weaver]

I will sound like a cynic here, but it's sort of a joke when an introductory business textbook costs that much.

It's also a joke when something like basic calculus or basic chemistry textbooks cost that much.

The former because there's not much useful information in it, and the latter because not much changes, with the exception of references to use technology to do some of the grunt work. (I had a double major, one major in business, and one in mathematics. I'm still floored by just how little tangible anything there was in the business core courses, and the entry level courses were even worse).

When I was in college, we had a professor who was disgusted with the textbook market for a materials science course, so he wrote his own and offered it for $19. He took his job very seriously, and provided an excellent and very interesting course.

College is a business. One that gets to pretend that it's not for profit, and not pay any taxes on their buildings and property, etc. And they get special status so that they can arrange to have you financed at low rates so that their bill can be higher. What's happened with colleges in the last 20 years, so far as I can tell, is a building and brochure picture contest without any increase in the quality of education.

A lot of the professors are pretty arrogant about why you need to have a very specific exact textbook for entry level courses, or even 3 or 4 hundred level courses in common subjects. There could be some standardization in that, but there is no incentive to do it.

If you start talking about subjects like surgical techniques for large cold blooded animals, etc, then there is going to be a pretty limited market no matter how universal or ubiquitous the book may be in its area.

But the bottom line is if you're in the courses and the professor uses a specific textbook a lot, you just have to pay it or hope to find a copy online for less.

[Jerome Stanek]

Did you try looking up the ISBN on the internet. When my kids where going to collage thats what they did and saved a bundle.

[Brian Kerley]

There is really no reason why they shouldn't go all digital.

Going digital doesn't change the cost much. Materials and shipping costs are a few percentage points of the cost.

The big issue (that someone here pointed out) is that they release new editions every year with small tweaks. This allows them to instantly obsolete all those used books and force people to buy new. The used book market hurts the manufacturers bottom line, so they do something to get around it.

The used video-game market is being targeted by the publishers as well. Expect that market to dry up in 5 years time.

[Brian Elfert]

Going digital would allow publishers to wipe out the entire used market. Books could be registered to a student and not usable on another device. Not saying this is a good thing.

[Greg Portland]

There are ways to secure a PDF. Alternatively, just use Kindle.


Why do textbooks cost so much?The first business lesson is supply and demand :-).

[David G Baker]

I purchased used text books from the campus book store if they were available. This was back in the early 60s and I thought the used book price was outrageous back then.

[Larry Browning]

I understand that most textbooks are being offered as digital rentals. Most schools are offering them at a substantial discount. Another advantage of digital is that all of your textbooks can be loaded onto a single reader, allowing for a much lighter load when heading to the library to study. No hassle selling back the used books. I think you can easily pay for the reader in 1 or 2 semesters.

[Bruce Page]

We got our daughter through pharmacy school on second hand books for the most part. We did have to buy a couple of new $400 books though. I think Rod hit it on the head though, it is a specialty item, and we all know how those cost. :rolleyes:

[Brian Ashton]

Something he'll be learning about - economy of scale and to a certain degree elasticity

[Brian Ashton]

There is really no reason why they shouldn't go all digital.

Also, some text books can be rented. Maybe an avenue to check into in the future.

They are and the publishers are pushing that. Problem for them is getting students to want to do it. I'm the only one in my class that downloaded the digital book for auditing... Also it eliminates the ability for a student to sell their books. So it should be no coincidence that publishers will soon force students to buy digital.

[Kevin Bourque]

I bought all my books from students who didn't need them anymore. I always got them cheap.

[John C Lawson]

Some things are just too obscure to be cheap. My daughter in seminary just paid $170 for a lexicon of New Testament Greek. How many of those get sold each year? And there are revised editions not because the New Testament changes, but because scholars continue to investigate what the words really meant.

[Don Morris]

All of the above

[John M Bailey]

"Why does the furniture you build cost so much?"

This reminds me of the question I get when people who have no clue about custom woodwork.
By the way, I have worked 19 years in the binding business. I know why books cost a lot.

[Greg Portland]

"Why does the furniture you build cost so much?"

This reminds me of the question I get when people who have no clue about custom woodwork.
By the way, I have worked 19 years in the binding business. I know why books cost a lot.
John brings up an interesting point. In India you can buy books with the same content for significantly less. They use significantly cheaper paper and bindings (same publisher).

[Dan Friedrichs]

John brings up an interesting point. In India you can buy books with the same content for significantly less. They use significantly cheaper paper and bindings (same publisher).


Assuming that these are not pirated copies (which is a MAJOR problem), yes, this is true. A friend purchased a copy of an "international" textbook which had basically see-through pages (very difficult to read the text due to the text on the opposite side showing through), yet, the paper must have also been thicker, as the entire book was about twice the thickness of mine (same number of pages, though).

[Mike Cutler]

Glad to see that not much has changed since my college days.
I thought then, and still believe, it is utter nonsense how much books cost. I will never be convinced that they are not really much more than an additional revenue stream for the colleges, and authors. I just don't buy it.
Republishing books every year is dumb. It serves only to increase the sales distribution of the books and the payback to the author, whom often times was one of the Prof's at the school or was a tenured Prof at a more prestigious institution that local colleges were affiliated with.
While it is true that some subjects can dynamically change in short periods of time. Most do not.
I was especially galled when a 3 credit English class required NINE BOOKS! for the first semester alone when I was in college. In 1977 this was $500.00 for one 3 credit class. Over half the books were authored by faculty prof's. I bought the used ones and still 4.0'd the class.

[John M Bailey]

Assuming that these are not pirated copies (which is a MAJOR problem), yes, this is true. A friend purchased a copy of an "international" textbook which had basically see-through pages (very difficult to read the text due to the text on the opposite side showing through), yet, the paper must have also been thicker, as the entire book was about twice the thickness of mine (same number of pages, though).


The reason the paper was thicker is that the cheap book uses uncoated lightweight paper. The more expensive paper is heavier, thinner, coated and cost a whole lot more.

[Jackie Outten]

I feel your pain. Our youngest daughter just graduated this past May and we spent a ton of money on books. There are times when you don't have a choice about what you pay for the books because the college bookstore may be the only place to find what you are looking for but the last two years we rented books from Chegg and she was able to download some of her books which was a substantial savings.

[Brian Elfert]

John brings up an interesting point. In India you can buy books with the same content for significantly less. They use significantly cheaper paper and bindings (same publisher).

Publishers generally cover most or all of their expenses with copies sold in 1st world countries. A big reason they sell cheaper in 3rd world countries is piracy. Nobody would buy the book at full price and would buy a pirated copy instead. They would rather make a little money than none at all. Nobody in most 3rd world countries thinks twice about buying a book and selling copies of it. The publisher usually doesn't want to spend the money to take legal action in another country.

Microsoft sells Windows really cheap in 3rd world developing countries. Again, nobody would pay full price in those countries.

[Greg Peterson]

Because they can.

They have an audience that is forced to buy a book. Therefore, they can charge whatever they want.

Prime example of supply/demand.


Not to mention that with student loans and such, it all gets thrown into the loan. So if a kid isn't having to bear the cost right now, it's hard for them to complain. Hell, federally backed student loans is one big contributor to why college expenses have risen so highly to begin with.

Actually, tuition has slowed in recent years. In the late 90's, I was paying $30/credit hour at the community college. In 2006, tuition had gone up to $66/credit hour. Since 2006, it has 'only' risen to $82/credit hour.

In 2010, congress cut out the middle man, private lenders, and backed student loans directly. Until 2010, the feds backed privately issued student loans via guarantee agencies. The private lenders got their money plus interest either way. Pretty sweet deal for the lender, but bad deal for tax payers.

[Gary Hodgin]

I don't have a real good answer but I can tell you what my experience with textbooks was the last ten or so years I taught. One thing is that the typical Intro to Bus text is cheaper than a typical Advanced Topology text. A lot has to do with scale and with more substitutes (competition) for the Intro book. The math book just doesn't have the market an intro book does.

Second, your grandson most likely got more than the textbook. Nearly all intro books in fields where they're a lot of students have digital packages with them. These packages vary but in introductory economics courses it's common to have a website devoted entirely to the course. Homework assignment and grading, out of class exams, computerized grading, outside readings, etc... At most schools, professors are at a minimum "encouraged" to use these packages. Often I could get a e-book instead of hard copy, but the prices weren't much different. BTW, very few professors consider the price of a text in their adoption decision. They get their's at no cost.

The digital packages are also a way the publishers can limit the used textbook market. You receive a password when you buy a text. The password allows you to access the website. The password is unique and is timed to expire at the end of the term. If web access is required for the course, which it is likely to be, the textbook is of little value without a password to access the website. Some publishers do sell passwords without buying the text, but typically you're about as well off buying the whole package new. Depending on what's in the package, it's sometimes cheaper to by a new course pack than to try to buy a couple of the components separately.

It looks like the ability to digitize written material would have driven the costs and price of textbooks down. I think it has driven the production cost down but not the price.

[Chris Kennedy]

I don't have a real good answer but I can tell you what my experience with textbooks was the last ten or so years I taught. One thing is that the typical Intro to Bus text is cheaper than a typical Advanced Topology text. A lot has to do with scale and with more substitutes (competition) for the Intro book. The math book just doesn't have the market an intro book does.

Second, your grandson most likely got more than the textbook. Nearly all intro books in fields where they're a lot of students have digital packages with them. These packages vary but in introductory economics courses it's common to have a website devoted entirely to the course. Homework assignment and grading, out of class exams, computerized grading, outside readings, etc... At most schools, professors are at a minimum "encouraged" to use these packages. Often I could get a e-book instead of hard copy, but the prices weren't much different. BTW, very few professors consider the price of a text in their adoption decision. They get their's at no cost.

The digital packages are also a way the publishers can limit the used textbook market. You receive a password when you buy a text. The password allows you to access the website. The password is unique and is timed to expire at the end of the term. If web access is required for the course, which it is likely to be, the textbook is of little value without a password to access the website. Some publishers do sell passwords without buying the text, but typically you're about as well off buying the whole package new. Depending on what's in the package, it's sometimes cheaper to by a new course pack than to try to buy a couple of the components separately.

It looks like the ability to digitize written material would have driven the costs and price of textbooks down. I think it has driven the production cost down but not the price.

The limited market is a major contributor. It is a main reason why new editions are released -- it makes the old edition out of date and circumvents the used market. In many instances, publishers will simply re-order the problems at the end of the section to make it difficult for students to use different editions.

The bundles have risen prices a little, but not a lot. I cannot speak for all areas, but bundling Course Compass with our textbook adds a grand total of $7 to the price, assuming it was bought with the hardcopy. The stand-alone electronic access with no hardcopy but an e-book runs $80.

One thing that I observed while in college was the advent of color printing in textbooks. I watched the price of Stewart's Calculus increase by $50 from one edition to the next, simply because it had color graphics. If you look at an intro book in math these days, there are photos, and colored boxes, and highlighted sections and all manner of things that make it look fancy, don't really change the content, and I'm certain raised the cost.

On the other hand, the price of higher level books has been reasonably stable over the last few years. There has been some increase, but there has also been some push back. For example, one publisher is putting out books compiled directly in LaTeX (math typesetting language for those unfamiliar with it), and since there is little prep to be done on the part of the publisher, it keeps the cost down. My real analysis book cost me $55 used in 1995, and I just bought a SUMS book for about $60. There was one for only $35.

Cheers,

Chris

[Dick Strauss]

A friend of mine had his dad buy all of his books and ship them from India. He saved about 70% off of the bookstore price including the shipping costs.

Amazon does offer used books for sale to counter the ridiculous college bookstore prices.