Interesting Tidbit of Microsoft News

Microsoft shutting down their book indexing operations
[Source: Search Engine News May 24th, 2008]

I thought from the title that Microsoft was going to begin outsourcing the indexing of their publications. However, the story deals with Microsoft's giving up an attempt to match Google's project to scan and index existing books for the Web.

Were Indexers Underpaid in 1972 or Are They Overpaid Now?

That title probably raised some hackles, didn't it? Perhaps it will even encourage comments. In a dead period, I started thinking about the income and value of indexing work. Value, being as far as I can tell, just about impossible to measure in any concrete, dollars and cents terms, I looked at pay rates. Since I began indexing in 1972, I had some place to start. In Chicago at that time, the average rate of pay, at least for clients I had (the American Library Association, the University of Chicago Press, Loyola University Press, and Scott, Foresman plus some individual authors, was $4.00 per hour. This was also the rate indexing abstractors were paid for one of the original online magazine databases. I'm probably a bit low now for indexers with my experience, but I've been charging $55/hour for the past year. So that is a 1275% increase.

How has the Consumer Price Index (CPI) increased? About 430%. A $4.00/hour income in 1972 would equal a $21.19/hour income in 2008 in terms of purchasing power. A 1.26oz. Hershey bar in 1973 cost $.10. In 2005, a 1.55oz Hershey bar cost $.59. Forgetting about the effect of “Supersize Me” and matching the cost based on equal sizes, it works out to $.48 in 2008, or a 490% increase. In 1972 a six-pack of 12oz. cans of Pepsi cost $.69; in 2005, a two liter bottle cost $1.09(calculating exactly equal amounts would be $1.16 or a 68% increase. [I'm not going to cite all the sources for these individual prices but they are easily findable through Google.]

A publisher looking for an indexer in a Help Wanted advertisement in the March 5, 1972 issue of the New York Times, was willing to pay up to $8,000/year. Another ad published earlier in the year was offering $173/week. Assuming a 50 week year, this would be $8,650/year. Acquisition editors in 1973 were making as much as $18,000 and intermediate level editors were sought at salaries between $7,500 and $9,100. It would take more research time than I have available to document fringe benefit percentages in 1972, but let’s assume they amounted to 20% of base salary (benefits typical are a higher percentage nowadays). Given these figures, total income for salaried indexers was somewhere just under $10,000. In the next paragraph you will not the great disparity between these advertised salaries and the income reported by the 1973 ASI data, which however may include both salaried and freelance indexers.

The American Society of Indexers 2004 salary survey (summary) lists an average income of $50,000 to $54,999 (giving a range makes me think they mean a median rather than mean) for full-time salaried indexers. Adding 20% fringe benefits to the $50,000 figure (salaried income plus benefits equals $60,000 or 650% over a 1973 salary. In the ASI survey, the income range for full-time independent contractors was $45,000-$49,999. From the same survey information, the 1973 range for hourly rates was $7.50 to $12.50/hour. This is a bit more than my clients in Chicago were paying, but the survey notes 1973 had "low returns," so I'm not sure how comparable this data is. However, the annual income in 1973 is shown as $9,000 to $30,000.

2004 hourly rates are given as $30 to $34. Comparing $7.50 to $50, which from anecdotal evidence is what a number of indexers are now charging, is a 733% increase. The 1973 personal income tax rate was 14%. A personal exemption for a single person in 1973 was $750, and the standard deduction was $1,300. Simplifying things, and using the $9,000 figure (with a possibly questionable assumption that the lower figure is more likely to appy to independent contractors), leaves a tax bill of $973, or a net of $8,027.
Let’s look next at the 2004 report (assuming it was based on 2003 data) from ASI, using the $45,000 income rate for independent contractors. The standard deduction (single person) was $4,750 and a personal exemption was $3,050. Net taxable then would be $37,200. The income tax on this was $3,910 plus 25% of the excess over $28,400 or $6,110, leaving $38,890 net.

I’ll leave the self-employment tax issue aside because it complicates the calculations since it is based on net income from self-employment and brings in too many imponderables. However, just as a matter of interest, the SE tax in 1973 was 8% and in 2004 it was 15.3%, so it has nearly doubled, but the change in CPI mitigates against this a bit.

Summary:
1973 Net Income (ASI): $8,027
1973 CPI (1982-84=100): 44.4
2004 Net Income (ASI): $38,890
2004 CPI (1982-84=100): 184

Percent increase in Net Income: 384%
Percent increase in CPI: 314%
Percent increase in Hershey Bar: 490%

Conclusion: We’re doing better marginally (or significantly better if you look at salaried indexers) than the change in CPI but falling way behind in buying chocolate. It’s even worse: Have you seen the price for the kind of chocolate we’re supposed to eat for health reasons now? I mean the 70% minimum cocoa, organic, and ethically traded dark chocolate bar, which costs me $1.69 for a 1.4oz. bar. That’s a whopping 1420% increase for a comparably-sized (albeit healthier) chocolate fix!

I’ll restate the question: Do the facts really support the occasional indexing list comments about how undervalued indexers are?

More Articles on Indexing

Here is a link to three more articles on Indexing by Shoshana Hurwitz.

http://elephant.org.il/indexing/

Indexing History Article

Here's an interesting summary of the history of indexing by an indexer.

All About Indexing #4: A History of Index Creation

Indexing Video Content

I came across this while surfing--one more Google operation.

The Future of Indexing Video is Goog-411??, Carrie Hill, 30 December 2007.