What is the Fair Price for Article Writing?

A word of caution, this article is not meant to dissuade aspiring writers. I do not mean to generalise but just presenting the feasibility of taking up writing as a money-making endeavour based on prevailing market conditions.

I have been on home duties since my son was born ten months ago. I didn’t mind staying at home since my son is quite a difficult baby and required constant attention in the beginning. However, as he becomes more and more conscious of the world around him, I am now experiencing a little bit of downtime during the day. I have always enjoyed writing so I thought it is a good way to make use of my spare time and earn a little bit of money on the side. But how little is the money involved caught me by surprise.

I decided to test the waters by joining HubPages. They warned from the start that earning money from Google Adsense takes time and doesn’t come easy. Eight weeks on and 19 hubs since I started with HubPages, I have generated one cent from Adsense. My statistics are not encouraging either considering that only a handful seems to be reading my articles when compared to the readership base of HubPages. In terms of followers, I have managed to attract ten (excluding my hubby whom I forced to join HubPages so I could have at least one follower in the beginning). I don’t know if following other Hubbers just for the sake of fabricating a legion of followers would work. So enough of testing with HubPages and I decided to search other platforms to earn quicker money from my writing. I came across o-desk, a virtual labour marketplace for various business services and looked at the rate the employers are paying for an article. On the average they pay one dollar for each article of around 350-400 words but it can go as low as 50 cents. I thought this must be a joke! It is probably the cheapest rate you can find for a service in o-desk. Gone were the days when writers were held in high-esteem. With the advent of the internet, just about anyone can be called a ‘writer’.

So is the 50 cents per article a rip off or a fair price for the amount of effort that a person needs to exert to come up with an article that is expected to be of modest standards? If you do a cost-benefit analysis and take into consideration the power consumed in using the computer, the cost of internet connection and the wear and tear of the computer equipment, the net payment to the writer is probably around 70% of 50 cents which equates to a measly 35 cents per article. This is the compensation for the writer for his time, effort and brain cells used in the course of writing the article. So what can you buy with 35 cents in a developed country? Not even a bar of chocolate on special. On the other hand, 35 cents is enough to pay for a bag of bread for breakfast in a third world country.

In a free and unregulated marketplace, pricing strategy is a way to eliminate competitors. People living in a first world country would find the price being charged by service providers from a third world country insanely low that it’s simply not worthwhile to partake in the activity. Is this a simple case of unfair competition? Perhaps, but it is just how a free market operates. The price dive in article writing is nothing new in the face of a borderless economy. The same thing happened when manufacturers decided to shift their factories to developing countries on account of cheap labour. As we all know, the biggest operating expense of a business is wages. Bring down the labour cost and the company ends up with a bigger profit margin. Although market players will argue that bringing down the cost of production is ultimately beneficial to the consumers.

Fair pay for fair work is the ideal principle for compensation. This is relative though to the standard of living in the country where the worker is based. 50 cents per article may be good enough to help defray the cost of living in a developing country. In a developed country, this amount is negligible.

I’ve always thought that if someone is self-employed (this is what freelance writers sometimes refer to themselves) or is employed on a casual basis, you can expect the base rate to be higher to offset the non-entitlement to the fringe benefits of a regular employee (e.g. zero leave entitlements, no employer superannuation contribution, etc.). I also thought that occupations that are more cerebral in nature pay slightly higher than menial jobs. The pay rates for article writing negated these views. Maybe it’s more like an investment with a low yield rate as seems to be the model behind HubPages. Maybe it is a case of expecting too much and knowing too little.

People write for a variety of reasons. Some use it as a past time, some use it to share their thoughts, some use it for evangelisation and some use it to earn money. Given the ridiculously low return rates, I asked myself this question: Is article writing a hobby or a means to earn extra income? In my perspective, writing is a double edged sword. It is an excellent medium for self-expression, a means to attain the pinnacle of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs but given the nominal financial rewards, it is also not a tool to satisfy the basic needs…if you’re living in a developed country. Perhaps it is time to give catalogue walking a go as it is not only more financially rewarding but it is good for the heart too.