Any writer considering a career in
publishing must first face the fact that
the job market is fiercely competitive—
and it’s shrinking. Over the past two
decades, according to the U.S. Bu-
reau of Labor Statistics, the number
of people working in book publishing
has plummeted from just more than
91,000 in 1997 to roughly 60,000 at the
end of 2018, with the most precipitous
drop coming in the wake of the 2008
financial crisis.
Because jobs are scarce and the work
is engaging and prestigious, publish-
ing professionals are both highly
qualified—nearly everyone has a col-
lege degree, and Ivy League diplomas
are common—and often underpaid.
This is particularly true in the early
years of one’s career, when most
would-be editors, agents, and book
publicists pick up on-the-job training
in a series of internships and assistant
positions. According to Glassdoor,
an online employment site, editorial
assistants in New York City average
about $39,000 a year, which sounds
okay until you take into account the
long hours assistants put in and the
fact that the cost of living in the city is
more than double the national average.
Internships, which serve as gateways to
assistant jobs, often pay nothing at all.
Newcomers may be able to bypass
some of this apprentice period by en-
rolling in a publishing course, which
typically offers classes on book and
magazine publishing as well as job fairs
for would-be applicants. But this, too,
can be expensive. The prestigious six-
week Columbia Publishing Course,
at Columbia University’s journalism
school, for example, costs $8,575, in-
cluding room and board.
Of course not all publishing jobs are
in New York City. Many independent
presses, like Tin House Books (Port-
land, Oregon), Coffee House Press and
Graywolf Press (Minneapolis), Copper
Canyon Press (Port Townsend, Wash-
ington), and McSweeney’s Books (San
Francisco), are spread out across theUnited States, and a number of liter-
ary agents live and work outside New
York City. But these tend to be smaller
operations, and people interested in a
career in publishing gravitate toward
New York, where there are far more
jobs and where it’s easier to jump be-
tween firms without having to move
to a new city.
At literary agencies, where agents
earn most of their money from com-
missions on their writers’ work, the
math is even more complicated.
Agents typically take 15 percent of
their writers’ U.S. income and 20
percent of foreign earnings, but new
agents landing their first clients may
not have significant earnings to draw
from for years. Agencies handle this
in a variety of ways, the most common
being the employment of so-called
“baby agents” who handle subsidiary
rights and other more administrative
duties at the agency as they build their
client list.
At Folio Literary, Cusick earns whatthe practical writer HOW TO GET PAIDJULY AUGUST 2019 72