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For what it's worth, I think that actually paying people to review would lead to all kind of foreseeable and unforeseeable problems, because adding money to a situation always does. (Although sending contracts to the accounts department is a great way to troll big publishers.) /1 https://twitter.com/sTeamTraen/status/1301846682469044224
When well-meaning people propose to fix an injustice in a system, they tend to treat it like a car that has a wobbly wheel. You identify the wheel and fix it. Job done.
But systems typically aren't like that. They are equilibria. /2
But systems typically aren't like that. They are equilibria. /2
The academic publishing system is an equilibrium between many factors, one of which (we tend to forget, if we ever thought about it in the first place) is that for one of its customers, namely authors, it is almost free to use up substantial resources, by submitting a paper. /3
(Yes, with Gold OA, you get to pay when your article is submitted, but it costs nothing to submit to almost any journal. I've seen a couple of cases where journals asked for a handling charge of ~$100 and people --- including on Twitter --- went ballistic.) /4
Now, of course many papers get desk-rejected, but most quarter-decent ones get sent out for review. (I know, because I recommend rejection for about half the papers I review, as they seem unsalvageable. Usually the editor agrees. Could have been desk-rejected but wasn't.) /5
So, what does the world look like when every second manuscript is going to be sent out to two reviewers, getting paid $900 between them courtesy of @450Movement? Do we think that Elsevier or Wiley will be reducing their bottom line by $900 and feeling suitably contrite? /6
Here are some of the things that I think could happen, based on (a) having lived for nearly 60 years in a market-led world and (b) what happened with OA. /7
First, a market will spring up. There will be people who want $450 whose review isn't worth that, and others whose review is worth $450, but who will settle for $250. Or $50. Even $20 is a lot of money to many grad students in some countries (and a few in many countries). /8
This market will get more sophisticated. Agencies will arise to help put publishers in contact with people who will do their reviews for the right price. Some of those agencies might be completely scrupulous, but I think we have to entertain the possibility that some may not. /9
Second, if the $450 line holds, universities and funders will become aware that it is possible for grad students and postdocs to make decent money doing reviews. They will ask why people who can do 2 reviews a month can't manage with $10,000 less on their stipend/fee waiver. /10
Extending this, universities will start to encroach on reviewer's time. Contracts will include requirements to declare this extra revenue, "to ensure you aren't overloading yourself with work beyond your program". Maybe the uni will take a waffer-theen slice as overhead. /11
Anyone want to bet that "Proven ability to contribute to scholarship by performing peer reviews" won't start to become a major desideratum when hiring? /12
Third, the already-common practice of professors getting their underlings to do their reviews and submit them under the prof's name ("I know you did it, but this journal insists all reviewers have a PhD, so I can't put that on the form") will be incentivised AF. /13
The professor is the one getting the $450. He or she may or may not share some of that amount with the underlings. My guess is that in many cases the latter will be lucky to get a beer and some nachos. But it's "all part of your training". /14
(Oh, the money the underling gets is probably after the professor has paid their self-employment deductions and income tax, and itself taxable. You might need the underlings and prof to set up an LLP to avoid double taxation.) /15
Fourth, journals would have huge incentives to change their review policies. If authors don't pay to submit then desk rejections will skyrocket (which might not be a bad thing for science, if done right, but don't complain when it happens to your Higgs Boson paper). /16
Currently you sometimes get reviews from 3 or 4 people, if the editor got lucky when sending it out to several reviewers and more than expected said yes. Want to bet that editors will send out more than one invitation at a time when "yes" means $450 to pay out? /17
One way around that would be to put all the submitted (and not desk-rejected) abstracts on a web site, and let people bid to review them. Again, though, I don't think anyone's getting $450 from that. Bonus: Think about the issue of verifying the credentials of the bidders. /18
I'm sure that none of the above points are precise descriptions of what would transpire. But if reviewers were to be systematically paid, I would be surprised if some variety of at least one of them did indeed come about. /19
As I said at the top, everything is an equilibrium, and when you disturb that -- especially if you lubricate it with money -- it will re-establish itself in another configuration. Well-meaning people are not always good at recognising that. /20
Of course, these things may be a price worth paying in order to no longer have the undoubted iniquities of the current system. But if they do happen, I hope we don't go "Oh noes, we thought that paying reviewers would make all possible bad things disappear for ever". /21 /end
