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A job loss can be traumatic, setting off a myriad of financial problems.
But taking the right steps, sooner rather than later, can help reduce the disruptiveness.

Wanan Yossingkum | Istock | Getty Images

The labor market is still strong, but layoffs are picking up.
This year Peloton, Netflix, Shopify, Lyft, and, most recently, Twitter, all announced significant staff reductions. Meanwhile, executive outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas reported this week that job-cut announcements were up 48% year-over-year in October, with more layoffs on the horizon.

Getting terminated can be traumatic, setting off a myriad of financial problems.
By taking certain steps, sooner rather than later, you can reduce the disruption and boost your odds of a positive next chapter, experts say.

1. File to collect unemployment benefits ASAP

You should file for unemployment benefits as soon as possible after a layoff, said Andrew Stettner, the director of workforce policy and senior fellow at The Century Foundation.
Even if you received unemployment benefits earlier in the pandemic and are facing joblessness again, you may qualify for more aid.

The rules vary state by state, but generally, so long as you’ve worked at least 15 weeks since last receiving unemployment benefits, you’re eligible to open a new claim for a partial payment, Stettner said. Most people will need to have been working for at least six months to qualify for a full benefit again.

If you’ve been employed for more than a year, your benefit should come fairly quickly.

2. Weigh health insurance options

Job losses can also often mean losing your health insurance.
“As overwhelming as it may be, it’s important to look for coverage quickly” after a layoff, said Caitlin Donovan, a spokesperson for the National Patient Advocate Foundation, a nonprofit that helps individuals access and pay for health care.  
Your first step should be to speak with someone in your company’s human resources department to understand when your coverage technically ends.
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“There’s no blanket rule here: For some, coverage may end immediately; for others, it may go until the end of the month,” Donovan said. “Either way, you should immediately start planning to transition to a new plan.” 
Navigating the health insurance landscape on your own can be stressful and confusing.
There are resources you can turn to for help. If you have a diagnosed condition, including cancer, lupus or diabetes, you may be able to get support deciding on and enrolling in a plan with the National Patient Advocate Foundation, Donovan said. You can also consult with a local health-care “navigator.” 

Generally, newly laid off and uninsured people will have three routes to coverage from which to pick: COBRA, the Affordable Care Act subsidized marketplace or a public plan such as Medicaid or Medicare.
COBRA gives those who have left a company the option of staying on their former employer’s insurance plan, although it’s typically very expensive. That’s because people have to keep paying the part of their premium they’d been responsible for while working, as well as the remainder, which their former employer had covered.
Medicaid typically involves no or low monthly premiums, and marketplace plans are the cheapest they’ve ever been for many people, thanks to relief legislation passed in the pandemic.

3. Protect your retirement savings

Many people save for their retirement through their job. If you had access to a 401(k) plan at the company from which you were laid off, you’ll need to decide what to do with that account.
You may not want to do anything, said Rita Assaf, vice president of retirement leadership at Fidelity.
Most employers allow you to keep your plan with them after you leave, Assaf said. (However, if you have less than $5,000 in the account, the money may be sent to an individual retirement account for you, she added.)
However, you won’t be able to continue contributing to a plan at a company you’re no longer working for. And you may be limited in how much you can take as a loan or withdraw from the account.

Make sure to research fees and expenses when choosing an IRA provider.

Rita Assaf
vice president of retirement leadership at Fidelity

Another option is to roll over the account into an IRA, which can be opened at a bank or brokerage firm. This would allow you to continue saving. You may also be able to withdraw money from this account if you’re under 59½ without any penalties, Assaf said, if you use it for a first-time home purchase or higher-education expenses.
“Make sure to research fees and expenses when choosing an IRA provider, if you do, though, as they can really vary,” Assaf said.
If you’re hopping to another job right away, you may have the option to roll your old 401(k) plan into one with your new employer. Having just one savings retirement account may feel more manageable.
“It’s important to note that not all employers will accept a rollover from a previous employer’s plan, so you should check with your new employer before making any decisions,” Assaf said.
What you don’t want to do, if at all possible, is to cash out the account, she said. You’ll likely be dinged with taxes and penalties, not to mention risking your financial security when you leave work for good.

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With rising costs squeezing margins, many retailers are rethinking their return policies, shortening the return window and even charging a return or restocking fee.
Expect more limitations on what can be brought back and when, experts say.

Policy adjustments ‘deter the consumer from returning’

With rising costs squeezing margins, many retailers are rethinking their return policies, shortening the return window and even charging a return or restocking fee, according to Spencer Kieboom, founder and CEO of Pollen Returns, a return management company. 
Stores such as Gap, Old Navy, Banana Republic and J. Crew (which was once well known for a generous return policy that spanned the lifetime of a garment) have shortened their regular return windows to within a month. Holiday shoppers have some reprieve: J. Crew and others are currently offering extended holiday returns and exchanges.

At Anthropologie, REI and LL Bean (which also once promised lifetime returns), there’s now a fee — all around $6 — for mailed returns.
“These adjustments in return policies are not there to cover costs,” Kieboom said. “They’re really there to deter the consumer from returning.” 

‘The supply chain is designed to go one way’

United Parcel Service (UPS) driver pushes a dolly of packages towards a delivery van on a street in New York.
Victor J. Blue | Bloomberg | Getty Images

With the explosion of online shopping during the pandemic, “free returns was a high convenience model the customer appreciated,” said Erin Halka, senior director at Blue Yonder, a supply chain consulting company management company. Now, with higher labor and shipping expenses, it is costing retailers “a tremendous amount of money” to sustain, she said.
“Charging for returns is one way to cover a portion of that cost,” she said. “It also can deter customers from overbuying, since at least 10% of returned goods cannot be resold.”   
Just as retailers struggle with excess inventory, “often returns do not end up back on the shelf,” and that causes a problem for retailers struggling to streamline expenses and enhance sustainability, Kieboom said.

Changing the return policy is an easier pill for the customer to swallow than an increase in the purchase price.

Lauren Beitelspacher
associate professor at Babson College

“The supply chain is designed to go one way,” said Lauren Beitelspacher, associate professor and chair of the marketing department at Babson College.
“The more money retailers lose on returns the more they have to make up for that by raising prices,” Beitelspacher said.
“Changing the return policy is an easier pill for the customer to swallow than an increase in the purchase price.”

How to avoid return fees

Still, shoppers love free returns almost as much as they love free shipping. In fact, 98% of consumers said that free shipping was the most important consideration when shopping online, followed by more than three-quarters who said the same about free returns, according to a recent report by PowerReviews. Affluent shoppers were even more likely to favor a free-return policy.
If the option to return is important, get to know the policies before you buy, experts say. Often, it’s not immediately clear, Halka said. “You typically have to dig into the fine print.”

Expect limitations on what can be sent back and when, she said. “A 30-day window is now typical.”
Factor the return policy into your buying decision, since it may impact your bottom line. “You have to find the return policy that works best for you,” Kieboom said.
And to avoid returns as much as possible, consider shopping in person when you can, Beitelspacher suggested. “The majority of returns come from having regret because it’s not what we expected. Shopping in person minimizes that expectation-reality gap.”
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Fidelity Investments, the largest 401(k) administrator by assets, began offering a bitcoin fund to workers this fall. ForUsAll started offering six cryptocurrencies to workers in recent weeks.
The companies appear to be the first administrators of 401(k) and similar workplace plans to offer crypto.
The U.S. Department of Labor has cautioned employers against offering the asset class due to risks like speculation and volatility.

Justin Tallis | Afp | Getty Images

Retirement savers in some 401(k) plans are starting to get access to cryptocurrencies like bitcoin.
Fidelity Investments, the largest provider of 401(k) plans by total assets, began offering a Digital Assets Account to clients this fall, a spokesperson confirmed.

Employers sponsoring a 401(k) plan through Fidelity can choose to offer the account to workers, allowing them to allocate a share of their savings to bitcoin.
For its part, ForUsAll, a plan administrator geared toward startups and small businesses, in September also rolled out crypto to 401(k) savers, said David Ramirez, the company’s CEO.
Investors can buy into six cryptocurrencies: bitcoin, ethereum, solana, polkadot, cardano and USDC. ForUsAll intends to add five more in the coming weeks, said Ramirez, who declined to disclose which ones.
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The firms appear to be the first administrators to make crypto available as 401(k) investment options.

The moves come as the U.S. Department of Labor in March urged employers to “exercise extreme care” before giving workers exposure to cryptocurrency. The regulator cited “significant risks” for investors, such as speculation and volatility.
Meanwhile, investor interest in crypto spiked amid record growth in 2021. But prices have since plunged in what some have taken to calling a “crypto winter.”

Bitcoin, for example, has lost more than 66% of its value from its high point in November last year. (For comparison, the S&P 500 Index is down about 20% in the past year.) Bitcoin’s current price, around $21,000 a coin, is almost triple its value from the beginning of 2020, and the S&P 500 is up about 17% over that time.
Fidelity declined to disclose how many clients have opted to offer the bitcoin account to workers.
Fifty ForUsAll clients have made crypto available to employees, and an additional 100 clients are expected to join soon, Ramirez said. Those 150 plans would represent about 27% to 28% of total clients. Ramirez estimated 70% to 80% of new clients have been asking to make crypto available.
“Our core goal has always been to provide equal access to wealth creation,” Ramirez said. “We just didn’t feel it was fair Americans would be left behind in the 401(k).”

Differing approaches to an alternative asset

At a technical level, Fidelity and ForUsAll offer crypto to investors in different ways.
Fidelity’s bitcoin account is one option that sits alongside other 401(k) investments like traditional stock and bond funds. The Digital Asset Account holds bitcoin and short-term, cash-like investments, which are meant to help facilitate daily transactions.
ForUsAll’s is part of a “brokerage window,” essentially a portal through which investors can gain access to dozens of additional investments that aren’t technically part of the core 401(k) options.
ForUsAll intends to make alternative asset classes like private equity, venture capital and real estate available through the window in the future, too, Ramirez said.

Fidelity and ForUsAll have installed certain guardrails to limit investors’ overall 401(k) allocations to crypto. For example, ForUsAll limits investor allocations to 5% of their current portfolio balance and sends investor alerts if that share exceeds 5% in the future. Investors, meanwhile, can’t put more than 20% of their balance into Fidelity’s offering, though employers can choose to lower that cap.
But employers may not be so quick to make cryptocurrency or alternative asset classes available to workers due to legal risk, experts said. Workers and other parties have brought multiple lawsuits against companies over the past decade-plus over allegedly risky and costly 401(k) funds.
ForUsAll sued the Labor Department over its cryptocurrency compliance bulletin issued in March. That case is yet unresolved.

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The average price of a new car is about $45,600, down from a high of $46,173 in July, a recent estimate shows.
However, rising interest rates are still pushing up the overall cost for consumers who finance their purchase.
Here how your credit score can impact the interest rate you may qualify for when you apply for an auto loan.

Tim Boyle | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Although prices for new cars are moderating a bit, financing a vehicle purchase hasn’t been getting any cheaper.
With the Federal Reserve’s latest interest rate hike — the sixth this year — auto loans are poised to become even more expensive. The Fed’s move has a ripple effect, generally causing rates to tick up on a variety of consumer loans and credit lines (and some savings accounts).

The average price of a new car is about $45,600, according to a recent estimate from J.D. Power and LMC Automotive. That’s down from a July peak of $46,173.
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However, rising interest rates are still pushing up the overall cost for consumers who finance their purchase. The average rate on auto loans has increased from an average 3.98% in March to 5.60% in October, according to Bankrate.
And depending on a buyer’s credit score, the rate could be in the double digits.
“On a car loan, the difference between good and bad credit could equate to several hundred dollars per month,” said Ted Rossman, senior industry analyst at Bankrate.

Your credit score is one of several variables considered

The higher your credit score, the lower the interest rate you may qualify for. 
This important three-digit number typically ranges from 300 to 850 and is used in all sorts of consumer credit decisions. Lenders also typically use information such as your income and other monthly expenses.
A good score generally is above 670, a very good score is over 740 and scores above 800 are considered exceptional, according to credit-reporting firm Experian. Scores below 670 are considered fair; anything below 580, poor.

The difference in the interest rate available across different credit scores can be stark.
For illustration: With a credit score in the 720-850 range, the average interest rate for a five-year, $45,000 car loan is just under 5.8%, according to FICO’s latest data. That translates into monthly payments of $865, and the amount of interest you’d pay over the course of the loan would be $6,890.
Compare that to what someone whose credit score fell between 660 and 689 would pay. That same loan ($45,000 for five years) would come with an average rate of almost 9.4%, resulting in monthly payments of $942 and $11,514 in interest over the life of the loan. (See chart below for other credit scores.)

While it’s hard to know which credit score will be used by a lender — they have options — having a general goal of avoiding dings on your credit report helps your score, regardless of the specific one used, experts say.
“Many credit-building tips are more of a marathon than a sprint: Pay your bills on time, keep your debts low and show that you can successfully manage different types of credit over time,” Rossman said.
“That said, there are some things you can do to improve your score quickly,” he said.

Top tip: Lower your credit utilization

His top tip? Lower your credit utilization ratio. “This is the amount of credit you’re using on your credit cards divided by your credit limits,” Rossman said.
He said that even if you pay off your balances every month, the credit-reporting firms — Experian, Equifax and TransUnion — often receive balance data before you’ve paid it.
“It’s typically reported on your statement date, so consider making an extra mid-month payment and/or asking for a higher credit limit to bring your ratio down,” Rossman said.

Check for mistakes on your credit report

Additionally, he said make sure there are no errors on your credit report.
To check for mistakes and get a sense of what lenders would see if they pull your credit report, you can get a free copy from each of the three big credit reporting firms. Those reports are available for free on a weekly basis through the end of next year.

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Close to 26 million Americans have applied for student loan forgiveness.
The White House’s plan could be in jeopardy due to GOP legal challenges.

SKLA | iStock | Getty Images

Close to 26 million Americans have applied for student loan forgiveness, and the Biden administration has already approved 16 million of the requests, the White House said Thursday.
Yet its entire loan cancellation plan could be in jeopardy due to the legal challenges brought by Republicans, it warned.

“If Republican officials get their way, tens of millions of Americans’ monthly costs will rise dramatically when student loan payments resume next year,” according to a statement by the administration.
“Working and middle-class Americans who could have up to $10,000 or $20,000 of their student debt relieved under the Biden Administration’s plan will remain under the burden of loan debt — preventing them from pursuing the dream of homeownership, saving up for retirement, or starting small businesses.”

Temporary stay on forgiveness still in place

Since the White House unveiled its plan in August to cancel $10,000 for most student loan borrowers, and up to $20,000 for those who received grants for low-income families, it has faced at least six lawsuits.
Most recently, a legal challenge from six GOP-led states temporarily stopped the administration from starting to forgive borrowers’ debt. Although their lawsuit was rejected by a federal judge in Missouri earlier this month, the states — Nebraska, Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas and South Carolina — have appealed.
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U.S. District Judge Henry Autrey in St. Louis ruled earlier this month that while the states had raised “important and significant challenges to the debt relief plan,” they ultimately lacked legal standing to pursue the case.
The main obstacle for those hoping to foil the president’s action has been finding a plaintiff who can prove they’ve been harmed by the policy, experts say.
“Such injury is needed to establish what courts call ‘standing,'” said Laurence Tribe, a Harvard law professor. “No individual or business or state is demonstrably injured the way private lenders would have been if, for instance, their loans to students had been canceled.”
The GOP-led states didn’t give up after their lawsuit was thrown out. They filed an appeal, and asked the court to stay the president’s plan, which was supposed to start unfolding last month, while their request is considered. The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals granted the states’ emergency petition, leaving the Biden administration unable to start forgiving any student debt for now.

GOP-led states’ effort ‘strongest of the lawsuits’

In their challenge, the states accuse President Joe Biden of overstepping his authority. They also say that the action would cause some private lenders to lose business because it would prompt millions of borrowers who have their federal loans held with these companies to consolidate their debt into the main federal student loan program. The U.S. Department of Education had said borrowers who hold these FFEL, or Federal Family Education Loans, can take this step to qualify for its relief.
The Education Department, in order to protect its broader loan forgiveness policy, has said that FFEL borrowers needed to have consolidated their loans by the end of September to be eligible. They can no longer do so to qualify.

This will make it harder for the GOP states to make their case that the president’s plan will cost the private lenders a considerable amount of business, said higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz.
“The state attorneys general lawsuit was the strongest of the lawsuits until the U.S. Department of Education pulled out the rug by eliminating their legal standing,” Kantrowitz said.
Tribe agreed, and said the other challengers also were on shaky legal standing.
“They represent a bunch of litigants in search of a theory,” Tribe said. “But in the end, it is the merits that matter, and there is little merit in their challenge.”

For now, having student loan forgiveness in the balance could actually help the Biden administration and Democrats in the midterm elections, experts say.
“Borrowers may be anxious about whether the forgiveness will happen,” Kantrowitz said. “This may spur more of them to vote.”
If Democrats retain control of the House and pick up seats in the Senate, he said, they could pass legislation forgiving student debt.

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A sign marks a Fidelity Investments office in Boston, Massachusetts, April 28, 2022.
Brian Snyder | Reuters

Fidelity Investments is launching a commission-free crypto trading product for retail investors.
The firm, one of the largest brokerages in the world handling $9.9 trillion in assets, opened an early-access waitlist to users Thursday morning. The service, called Fidelity Crypto, will allow investors to buy and sell bitcoin and ether and use custodial and trading services provided by its subsidiary Fidelity Digital Assets. Users will be required to maintain a $1 account minimum.

“Where our customers invest matters more than ever,” Fidelity said in a statement shared with CNBC. “A meaningful portion of Fidelity customers are already interested in and own crypto. We are providing them with tools to support their choice, so they can benefit from Fidelity’s education, research, and technology.”
While trades with Fidelity Crypto will be free of commission fees, the firm says it will factor in a 1% spread into every trade execution price.
Fidelity follows Robinhood and Binance.US in offering commission-fee crypto trading. The reveal comes at a time when investors are questioning the ability of Coinbase and other exchanges like it to generate revenue. Historically they have leaned on trading fees for revenue, but fee-free trading in crypto has become an increasing inevitability.

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In today’s job market, employers are expanding their benefit offerings to attract and retain workers.
Free college may be the most effective tool yet.
Most recently, Fidelity said it will offer free college to 18,000 employees, including entry-level customer service phone representatives.

Despite growing economic uncertainty, employers are still waging a war for talent, and employees are coming out ahead.
Now, more businesses are expanding their benefit offerings with free college programs to attract and retain workers.

Most recently, Fidelity Investments said it will offer fully funded undergraduate degrees to 18,000 employees, including entry-level customer service phone representatives. The company, which already offered student debt repayment, will cover the upfront costs for tuition, books and fees at select two-and four-year schools, avoiding the need for reimbursement. 
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Other major financial institutions, including Citi and PNC, announced similar offerings this year.
Roughly 38,000 Citi front-line consumer banking employees are eligible for its education benefits program, including free college. PNC’s tuition program is available to 62,000 employees.
“The war for talent is over,” PWC U.S. Chairman Tim Ryan said at the CNBC Work Summit last month. “Talent won.”

Coming out of the pandemic, these types of benefits play a big part in the competition for workers and, as a result, more companies are offering opportunities to develop new skills, according to the Society for Human Resource Management’s recent employee benefits survey. 
Now, 48% of employers said they offer undergraduate or graduate tuition assistance as a benefit, according to that survey.

Nationwide pizza chain Papa John’s also recently announced it is offering fully funded degrees, as well as tuition assistance for associate’s and master’s degrees and professional certificate programs.
Roughly 12,000 full- and part-time front-line employees, including delivery drivers and kitchen staff who work as little as 10 hours a week, are eligible for the education benefits program, including free college, according to the company.
“Wherever you can differentiate yourself is pretty critical,” said Marvin Boakye, Papa John’s chief people and diversity officer.

Wherever you can differentiate yourself is pretty critical.

Marvin Boakye
Papa John’s chief people and diversity officer

Other big corporate names, such as McDonald’s, T-Mobile, Amazon, Home Depot, Target, Walmart, UPS, FedEx, Chipotle and Starbucks, also have programs that help cover the cost of going back to school. Waste Management will not only pay for college degrees and professional certificates for employees but also offers this same benefit to their spouses and children.
Of course, employers paying for their employees to get a degree is not new. For decades, businesses have picked up the tab for white-collar workers’ graduate studies and MBAs.
However, many companies are now extending this benefit to front-line workers — such as drivers, cashiers and hourly employees — as well as heavily promoting the offering more than they have before.

Education benefits are ‘mutually beneficial’

For employers, education-as-a-benefit is “mutually beneficial,” said Fidelity’s head of benefits, Megan Bourque.
“For associates that have pursued undergraduate degrees, they have greater retention, greater mobility within the organization and tend to perform better, as well,” she said.
Chipotle Chief Financial Officer Jack Hartung told CNBC that employees who take advantage of the company’s free degrees are 3.5 times more likely to stay with the company and seven times more likely to move up into management.
Not only does free or discounted higher education improve recruitment and retention, it also cuts down on student debt while advancing the long-term well-being of employees, experts say.

Despite the advantages and what research shows is a strong desire among respondents to go back to school, less than half of employees said they have been able to pursue educational goals in the last several years, mostly due to the time commitment and financial obstacles, according to research by Bright Horizons.
The struggle is even greater among minority groups, Bright Horizons found: 44% of Black employees said they are having trouble affording education, compared with 29% of white employees.
There’s a similar discrepancy among men and women. Roughly 36% of working women report financial barriers to education, compared with 22% of men.
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Bob Pisani, CNBC
Scott Mlyn | CNBC

Thinking of writing a book? You might want to reconsider.
On Monday, a federal judge blocked Penguin Random House’s proposed purchase of Simon & Schuster, agreeing with the Justice Department that joining the two giant publishing houses would lessen competition for top-selling books.

As an author, I agree with this, except that there are startlingly few top-selling books.
Most authors would be better off working at a McDonald’s.

Hey, I wrote a book!

I just published a book: “Shut Up and Keep Talking: Lessons on Life and Investing from the Floor of the New York Stock Exchange.” It’s is a summary of what I’ve learned about financial markets while working at CNBC and on the NYSE floor for the past 25 years. 
My publisher, Harriman House, was thoroughly professional and a delight to work with.
This is the part where authors like to say, “It was a labor of love.”

Here’s the truth: It took two years of my life, working every single weekend, and one or two nights a week.
Every weekend. For two years. A labor of love? I love the product, and I’m glad I wrote the book.
 But getting there was brutal.

Writing a book? Forget about making money

Dreaming of six-figure advances for that masterpiece you have in your head? Forget about it.
If you want an idea of how ridiculous the book publishing industry is, look no further than the proposed Penguin Random House-Simon & Schuster merger. The Justice Department is attempting to block the merger, arguing that the combined entity would diminish competition among the biggest houses and push down advances for authors. A federal judge has agreed and blocked the deal from going through. Penguin Random House has said it would appeal.
Many interesting statistics have emerged from the trial. The good news: Book sales were strong during the pandemic. That’s understandable, considering so many people stayed at home.
The bad news: Only a tiny fraction of books make most of the money.
The New York Times reported that during their testimony, Penguin Random House executives said that just 35% of the books the company publishes are profitable, and just 4% account for 60% of those profits.
In 2021, fewer than 1% of the 3.2 million titles that BookScan tracked sold more than 5,000 copies, according to the Times.
Fewer than 1% sold more than 5,000 copies. 

A typical author is practically living in poverty

Dreaming of six-figure advances for your book? Forget about it. A typical author is practically living in poverty.
A 2018 survey of 5,067 authors conducted by the Authors Guild found that the median income of the authors surveyed had fallen to $6,080 in 2017. That’s down about 50% from 2007, when a joint Authors Guild/PEN survey reported $12,850 in median income (note: I am a member of the Authors Guild).
That is the median income. Earnings from book income alone was a paltry $3,100, indicating that authors were supplementing their incomes through speaking engagements, book reviewing, or teaching. 
No surprise, many authors supplement their income doing other things. Just 57% of published authors derive all of their income from writing-related work. Those who consider themselves full-time authors earned a median income of $20,300, “well below the federal poverty line for a family of three or more,” the survey noted.  
Is anyone making money? As in most things in life, the top 10% appear to be making what little money there is: They reported a median income of $305,000, but again this will include other income sources related to being an author. The top 10% of self-published authors made half that: $154,000.

Why has writing books become such a tough business?

What happened?
The Authors Guild report notes the explosive growth of alternative ways for consumers to spend their time (video and streaming). They also note that Amazon now controls 72% of the online book market in the U.S. 
Also, self-publishing happened: More than one million books were published in the U.S. in 2017 (up from 300,000 in 2009). Two-thirds of those books are self-published, according to a Bowker report cited by the Authors Guild. Self-published authors sell generally sell far fewer books and receive far lower royalties.

What can be done? How about more readers?

You can talk all you want about the lousy publishing business, but what would really help the book business is if people read more and bought more books.
Unfortunately, they’re not doing that. 
A Gallup poll conducted in December of last year found that Americans read an average of 12.6 books during the past year, a smaller number than Gallup has measured in any prior survey dating back to 1990.  The sobering conclusion: “Reading appears to be in decline as a favorite way for Americans to spend their free time.” 
That’s not a surprise. The competition for eyeballs has never been more intense. In 1990, there was no internet. There was no streaming. There were no podcasting.
Now, any fool with an iPhone can start a podcast or become a TikTok star. The media landscape has not splintered: It’s shattered.

And yet, books still get published

Which brings me back to my starting point: What kind of fool would write a book today?
I’m one. 
Here’s my message to would-be authors: You have to really want it. You have to really believe you have something to say. You have to believe it so strongly that you can feel the desire coming out of your skin.
You have to be willing to sacrifice the majority of your free time. And you have to forget the two things you’ll probably want: fame and fortune.
No, in most cases you’ll have to be happy that you were determined to say something and that you had the mental stamina and fortitude to get the damn book over the finish line. That is an accomplishment that you can feel proud of.
And that may be the ultimate reason books still get written: Regardless of how many books you sell or how much you get paid, there is still prestige associated with writing a book.
I’ve been at CNBC 32 years, so I’m well-known in a very small part of the world — the stock market. 
More fame? No. More money? It’s negligible. But the book has increased my visibility and the level of my prestige. I’ve been invited to more conferences and a lot of podcasts.
 And that makes a lot of the sacrifice worthwhile.

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