Rate hike pushed by media conglomerate Time Warner threaten small and medium-circulation publications ... well above 20 or 25 percent

May 17, 2007 | Postal Rates = Free Press | Rate hike pushed by media conglomerate Time Warner threaten small and medium-circulation publications | By Robert W. McChesney

In 1792, the United States Congress converted the free press clause in the First Amendment from an abstract principle into a living reality for Americans by providing newspapers with low postal rates. These low rates were crucial for the growth and spread of the abolitionist movement, the populist movement and progressive politics. More broadly, they have been central to development of participatory democracy in general.

Today, magazines like In These Times face an immediate threat to their financial health, and perhaps survival, due to a massive postal rate increase that will go into effect on July 15.

To the surprise of many independent publishers, in February the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC), the body in charge of determining postal rates, rejected a rate-hike plan that was submitted by the U.S. Postal Service, the people in the business of delivering the mail for the past 215 years. This plan was widely understood to call for an approximate 12 percent increase that would have hit all publications more or less equally.

Instead the PRC adopted a revised version of an extremely complicated proposal submitted by media conglomerate Time Warner that included a number of possible discounts favoring the largest publishers. Time Warner is the largest magazine publisher in the nation. To make up for the discounts and maintain their revenue targets, some magazines will have to pay a lot more than the 12 percent increase most had budgeted for. Research by McGraw-Hill, a magazine and book publisher, suggests many publications, particularly small and medium-circulation publications, could now be looking at immediate postal rate hikes well above 20 or 25 percent—thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional costs that will strain already tight budgets. ...