Working for Other People.

I went shopping today. When I went to the checkout, only four manned tills were open, all with a long queue, so of course I went to the self-check-out instead. You notice I call it 'self-checkout', not 'automated' checkout. It's not automated. If I didn't operate it, it would just sit there. So the supermarket obtained my work free, and pocketed the profit.

Then I went to fill up the car. It was raining; I stood outside filling up with the smelly nozzle and then went across to pay the cashier who was sitting there, warm and dry. Remember the days when you sat in your car, warm and dry and with nice clean hands while the paid assistant filled it up, wiped the windscreen and collected the cash? 'Self-service' – huh! We're not serving ourselves, we're serving the company. More free labor, done by muggins here.

Never mind the customer. Now it is all about the big companies' profits while down at the bottom of the food chain, we suckers give our services free. Or, moving into the area closest to our hearts, or at least our wallets, for derisory financial return.

A comprehensive report on authors' earnings in Britain disclosed that since 2005, authors have seen a 42% drop in earnings. The average annual income is now £10,500, and only 50% of authors rise above that figure.

Well, we often have it explained to is that it's because there's is no money in publishing. But let's take the example of Penguin Random House. (A random example, you could call it. Couldn't resist that – sorry.) Profits in 2005 were $1.828 m. And in 2017? $3.359m.

Book sales in Britain are booming – up 7% this year. That's on the back of our work – no authors, no book sales. I guess if you work in publishing, you can expect an increase in wages which will already be well above the minimum wage level, and possibly a bonus as well, but I doubt whether many of us will find this reflected in our own income. Happy, indeed, the author who, for hours worked, earns anything approaching the minimum wage.

Books are cheaper than ever before and Amazon takes care that it will stay that way. It makes more profit when it sells more books and sees to it that publishers fall into line. And of course the royalty on every £10 book sold is less than if it were £12. So, just like the supermarket, just like the gas station, the big company benefits from our loss.

We go on doing it for a number of different reasons. Most of us feel driven to write. Most of us get huge pleasure out of seeing our books in print and get real joy from hearing about the pleasure we give to others. Most of us like earning such money as we are offered.

But sometimes, on a curmudgeonly day when figures like these come out, I do feel really quite cross about it. Quite cross.