Prices of new textbooks have been going up faster than food, clothing, cars and even healthcare. James Cook, an economics professor at Old Dominion University, discusses the principle agent problem. This is a problem that means that the buyer is not the person choosing, meaning the professor picks the book but doesn't pay. Many professors do not pay close attention to the prices of books when making the decision of what book to choose for the course, as salesmen do not discuss prices. Many courses will end up with a textbook that is much fancier than what is actually needed in the class. Greg Mankiw's best selling economics textbook is $273. Mankiw even discusses the principle agent problem in his book. These issues are not uncommon though, when you build a new home, you rely on the construction company the price they name and so on. The textbook market is no different.
http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2014/10/03/353300404/episode-573-why-textbook-prices-keep-climbing
This is an interesting concept but also very relevant. I feel like students try to do their best to find a way around purchasing an expensive textbook. Whether that is taking their chances and not buying one at all or going on websites like Amazon or Chegg where they are able to pay less for a used book. However, there are definitely times where the situation is unavoidable and students just have to end up spending the money.
ReplyDeleteThis topic is very relevant, considering myself and all our classmates are effected by this. I myself have chosen not to buy a textbook due to the high costs. Every class has a specific book or books that are required for the class and students do not have a choice but to look for a used one, or some way to find the book for cheaper. This is a problem students face every semester when they start new classes.
ReplyDeleteI don't think professors are solely responsible for the high price of the books. The underlying cause might be the copyright policies that allow publishers to set high price of textbooks and in that case there is not a lot that professors can do.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't go as far as to say the professors don't say attention to the highly priced books, but it is definitely an issue that needs to be looked into. With the overall costs of going to college increasing steadily, with the new government look into this and treat it as a real problem? I certainly hope so.
ReplyDeleteI think that professors are aware of the prices that books have risen to. I would say the bigger problem is that there are very few textbook publishers that are trusted in this market. With there being so few publishers, these companies are able to charge the prices that they do.
ReplyDeleteI am not knowledgeable enough to identify who is at fault for the high prices of textbooks but me paying 300 dollars my first semester of freshman year is not going to be repeated. It is logical that people that do not by their books from their parents money and have not one the lottery ticket to find other ways to buy what is needed for the class that might not be ethical or ever borrow from other friends the coarse
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