Back in February I reported on a government survey of almost 15,000 British people in the UK that revealed ‘author’ is the most desired job in the country. But a couple of months later, a study has been published that reveals this is most certainly one of the riskiest job paths to take in terms of financial security.

Researchers at Queen Mary, University of London, interviewed 2,500 writers and released the following findings in a report entitled ‘The Business of Being an Author’:

• Only one in ten authors earn a living from writing alone (ten years ago the figure was four in ten).
• The average professional writer earns £11,000 per annum – beneath the minimum wage.
• At the top of the spectrum, 42.3 per cent of all income from professional writing is earned by 5 per cent of authors.
• 17 per cent of writers were paid nothing in a calendar year despite having published recently.
• Female authors earned 80 per cent of the income of male authors.

What are the reasons for the tight squeeze on writers’ incomes? Most are blaming the vast changes in the publishing industry making publishers reluctant to take risks, and so investing over and over in just a select group of authors, the ‘safe bets’, and celebrities.

Nicola Solomon of The Society of Authors said, “There is a tendency towards the safe,” she said. “But do we want safe? Surely the whole point of reading is to be introduced to things that are daring and challenging and different?”

Many writers have been open about the fact that building a secure income from their books takes time. For example, back in 2013 successful crime novelist Ian Rankin gave an interview to the Telegraphon the subject. “It took a good 12–14 years, and many books, before the money became a happy factor of my writing career,” he said.

Joanne Harris, author of one of my favourite novels of all time, Chocolat, has also spoken publicly on the issue. “Part of the problem,” she said, “is that, thanks to the media, the public has a distorted view of what the average author’s life is like. Not everyone can expect the kind of success earned by JK Rowling. If anything, quite the reverse.”

I agree that there is a certain romanticism associated with being an author. I also think that the vast majority of us do it not for the money at all, but for the sheer love of writing, for sharing the burning story within. In fact, the need to write is so compelling it can be deeply unsettling not to write!

What do you think? Joanne Harris claims that ‘most [authors] – yes, even ones you’ve heard of – are finding it harder to earn money creating the books that they, and you, love.’ Does that concern you? Should writers be better respected, better paid? How sustainable is the future of publishing with a handful of ‘superstar’ authors earning a fortune, and then a sea of authors either dedicating themselves to their craft and living beneath the minimum wage, or writing endlessly alongside a demanding day job? How must an author prove him-/herself before there is a sense that he or she deserves a decent living?