It wasn't just paper costs; if it was, 600-page books would be significantly more expensive than 300-page ones (assuming you could find an adult book that short), and they're not. I've heard various theories explaining the sudden rise, including:
(i) distribution and warehouse costs (ii) publishers being taken over by megacorporations who insisted on all branches of their empire making at least 8% profit, rather than the 2-4% that book publishers used to make (iii) the GST proving to publishers that (a) book addicts would continue to buy books however high the price and (b) the Howard government wouldn't interfere, but would make up for any revenue lost because of the higher prices by giving money directly to the megacorporations that owned the publisher (never to the authors)
One of the bizarre results of the price rise is that it's now much easier to sell hardcovers than it was. When I started as a bookseller, hardcovers cost up to ten times as much as paperbacks. Now, because the prices have gone up by about the same amount (another hint that distribution costs are the problem, rather than paper), they only cost twice to three times as much.
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Date: 2007-02-18 12:17 pm (UTC)(i) distribution and warehouse costs
(ii) publishers being taken over by megacorporations who insisted on all branches of their empire making at least 8% profit, rather than the 2-4% that book publishers used to make
(iii) the GST proving to publishers that (a) book addicts would continue to buy books however high the price and (b) the Howard government wouldn't interfere, but would make up for any revenue lost because of the higher prices by giving money directly to the megacorporations that owned the publisher (never to the authors)
One of the bizarre results of the price rise is that it's now much easier to sell hardcovers than it was. When I started as a bookseller, hardcovers cost up to ten times as much as paperbacks. Now, because the prices have gone up by about the same amount (another hint that distribution costs are the problem, rather than paper), they only cost twice to three times as much.
But yes, it is frustrating.