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Re: question about rates

I've been following this thread with some interest, and a lot of concern. There are several aspects that are disturbing.

First off, as I tell my freelance writing students, anyone who sets rates by the word better have a spouse with a good income.

The only commodity you have is time. And it cannot be bankrolled. Words are unlimited. You can buy a dictionary with 20,000 of them for less than ten bucks. But there are only 24 hours in a day, and once they are gone, they are gone. So all work should be figured on how long it will take you to complete the job, and how much you feel is a fair hourly rate.

Obviously that will vary by writer. By here's why by-the-word is all but meaningless.

Let's say a particular job pays a total of $1,000, for a 2,000 word story.  On the face of it, that's 50 cents/word.

You add up your time doing research, communicating with the editor, and writing the story and it works out at 100 hours. That becomes $10/hour. Which may or may not be a fair rate in your eyes. But let's say it takes you 500 hours to complete the task. Now you are working for $2/hour---roughly 1/3 the minimum wage.

For various reasons you might decide to take on the job even though $2/hour won't buy milk for your kiddies. But at least you know what you are actually earning.

Reverse that. You find a listing in Writers Markets or some such, in which they say they pay 50 cents/word. And they want stories in the 1,200 word range. Extrapolate out, and that's $600 for the job. Sounds pretty good. Unless it takes you two weeks of research, and a bunch of follow-up calls, and three days to write the story. And again, time is the determining factor.

The whole "by the word" thing dates back to the pulp magazines of the '30s and '40s. Which is why so many writers who learned their trade then were verbose. Their philosophy, understandably, was to never use one word when you could get away with five---or seven, or a dozen. That's also why so many stories written for the pulps---and later on in other magazines and books by those same authors---was such bad writing.

Next point. Virtually every magazine I'm familiar with (and I've been magazine freelancing fulltime for almost 25 years, so that's a bunch of them) publishes writers guidelines. If you don't have a copy of those guidelines, shame on you. At least 95% of them include their rates in the guidelines. Are those rates cast in stone? Absolutely not. But you at least you know the minimum payments they offer, whether or not photos are paid for separately, etc.

The other 5%? You usually are offered a payment rate along with the assignment or go-ahead. Typically the editor will say, "I love the idea. Gimme 1,200 words and three pix. I can pay you $800 for the package." Or some varient on that theme.

If not, you should ask then. Not after the job is done. Not so it's a surprise when the contract (if they actually use a contract: many magazines do not) is delivered. Right up front. What's more, if it seems low to you, say so right then. Don't give them a figure. Just say, "I can't do it for that amount." You'll be surprised at how often they come back with, "well, I could go to a thousand." Depends on how badly they want the story, and how badly they want you to write it.

It's inexplicable to me that a professional would agree to do a job of work without knowing ahead of time how much pay he/she will recieve.


Brook 
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