How Do Journals Subsidies Influence their Circulation in Iran?

Author

Faculty member of Tehran University

Abstract

The impact of direct and indirect subsidies to journals on their
circulation and demand for journals are the matter of importance in
this research paper. Two questions raise if subsidies are intended to
help them afford the journals' publication: ١. Do they really need to
receive subsidies? ٢. Do journals receive subsidies equally?
To find answer for the questions, the amount of subsidies paid to all
journals, the way their incomes were and the expenditures of nine
journals with a wide circulation were sampled.
For each journal, ٦٠ issues in ٢٠٠٦ (per months ٥ numbers) were
randomly sampled and were evaluated by income and expenditure
criterion.
Estimating the average income and expenditure for each journal
and determining the amount of benefit and loss, it was inferred that
to avoid their loss, paying subsidies to journals could be irrational as
well as did not agree with the average expenditures by journals.
Paying subsidies did not remain remarkable influence on the demand
for journals, too. This research paper firstly suggests the elimination
of subsidies to journals, then, if they want to continue paying
subsidies, it must be basically revised based on equalizing the total
amount of average benefit and average subsidy for each issue.

Keywords