Textbook
prices rising as new features are included
SACRAMENTO (AP) -- The cost of college textbooks
is rising as publishers increasingly bundle
CDs, videos and study guides with books
and issue new editions that make used copies
obsolete, a consumer group and a state lawmaker
charged Thursday.
The
California Public Interest Research Group
and Assemblywoman Carol Liu called on textbook
publishers to make books more affordable
by publishing supplements instead of new
editions and by exploring online textbooks.
"Textbooks
don't need to cost as much as they do,"
said Liu, a Democrat from South Pasadena
who is chairwoman of the Assembly Higher
Education Committee. "Students are
forced to pay full price for new editions
that are largely unchanged."
CalPIRG
found that University of California students
paid an average of $898 a year on textbooks.
The UC president's office, which tracks
student textbook costs, found that students
are paying 24 percent more since 1996-97,
the report said.
Publishers
take students' concerns seriously, said
Judith Platt, spokeswoman for the Association
of American Publishers. The industry is
working to find ways to keep textbooks affordable,
she said, but college texts cost more to
produce than mass-market books.
"It
can cost more than a million dollars over
a couple years to bring a textbook to market,"
she said. "We're talking about an extraordinary
expensive product, the price of which has
to be spread out over a limited number of
students."
CalPIRG
researchers questioned more than 500 University
of California students and examined the
33 books most often assigned by UC professors,
said Merriah Fairchild, the report's author.
The
report found that new editions for 25 of
the books were issued within three or four
years. Frequent new editions make the old
editions obsolete and often unavailable,
Fairchild said.
About
87 percent of the professors surveyed by
the group said they'd rather see the changes
put into a supplement, instead of having
new books produced.
Publishers
agree that the average textbook is reissued
within four years -- but that's to keep
the books up to date on research and world
events, Platt said.
The
books that are sold "bundled"
with CDs, videos and other study materials
cost less than if those items were sold
separately, Platt said, and students can
always order just the book by shopping around
or buying from the publisher.
Liu
said she would introduce legislation to
encourage those changes and to have publishers
list what changes each new addition made
to the book.
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