Royal Society publishing income and expenditure 1880-2010

 This spreadsheet contains our most complete series of income/expenditure data for Royal Society publishing, 1880-2010. It shows the income from sales and from grants; the expenditure on printing, distribution and other costs, for the Transactions and for the Proceedings; it provides calculations of surplus/deficit and expense recovery rate (which, given the nature of RS publishing in this period, is a more useful measure than expressing surplus as % of sales income). A variety of graphs are included, some of which appeared in my 2022 article 'From philanthropy to business' https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rsnr.2022.0021

    Sources of Data: 

 Data for 1880-1899 come from the series of financial ledgers and   annual balance sheets in the Royal Society archives. They do not distinguish   between costs/income for Transactions or Proceedings   

From 1900 onwards, the main run of income/expenditure data comes   from the published annual accounts of the Royal Society (in the Year Book   until 1999; and thereafter in the separately-published Trustees' Report). For   certain years, e.g. in the mid-20thC, it has been possible to supplement this   with more detailed breakdowns from the archival series. 

The data available become less detailed over time. Cost   breakdowns for paper/printing/illustrations etc are only available up to   1966. Income/expenditure breakdowns by journal (i.e.   Proceedings/Transactions/other) are only availble until 2005. Salary and   overhead costs are only sometimes available.  

Inconsistencies

There   are various inconsistencies to be aware of:        

 1. The Society changed its accounting year occasionally. This   spreadsheet reports the results for whichever accounting year the Society was   using at the time, and so users should be aware of moments of transition.   Traditionally, the Society's accounting year had ended on its anniversary day   (30 November). In 1939, it moved to a year-end of 30 Sept (so, 1939 figures   are for an 11-month 'year'). In 1968, it moved to a year-end of 31 Aug (so,   1968 figures are for a 11-month 'year'). In 1991, it adopted a year-end of 31   March (so, 1991 figures are for a 7-month 'year'). And, by c.2004, the   Publishing Team was reporting internally by Calendar Year, even though RS   officially still kept a March financial year...  

 2.   Decimalisation in 1971         

  3. Staff/overhead costs were sometimes included in the   publication account, and sometimes not. Staff costs WERE included from   1936-55 inclusive; and again from 1980 (though staff costs from mid-1970s can   be identified from the archives). After 2000, publishing staff costs were   often included in a bigger category of 'trading costs' and can't be separated   easily via the 'annual accounts' (but can be identified in JT analysis and ST   spreadsheet)                

Grants   Income 

From 1910 to 1957, the figure reported publicly for publications   income included income from grants/donations to support publications, as well   as sales income. There had been grants income supporting publications from at   least 1895, but there is no consistent source showing this. In this   spreadsheet, we have retrospectively created a 'publications income   (excluding grants)' figure for 1910-57 to allow a more consistent longue   duree comparison (though the 1895-1910 period should still be treated with   caution)