In a previous post I introduced the concept of open access publishing. Today, I talk about the most common model that is available to accounting researchers – the article publication charge (APC).

After peer review and editorial acceptance the business side of the publisher takes over. The open access option offers to make your article freely accessible from the day it is published to any reader, no subscription needed by the reader. All you the author has to do is to pay a fee!

The fees are hard to find for some journals. I spent 15 minutes looking for the APC charge on the AAA website. CAR can be found on the Wiley APC charge page as can Accounting and Finance! Elesiver’s page has AOS and jAE’s APC. But like TAR one has a hard time finding JAR’s open access pricing!

Apparently there are in principle two versions, the ” GOLD” level – open access immediately or the GREEN level – open access after one year. However for the top accounting journals, where I could find them at all, it appears to be GOLD or nothing!

Two final words on this model. In accounting the APC fees seem to be in the $2500 to $3500 US$ for GOLD open access. Second do not confuse legitimate open access payments and indeed open access journals, with the predatory journals that charge similar or lower fees but without rigorous peer review, editorial oversight, copyediting etc. Predatory journals are pure profit machines that provide no value added but change anything from $400 to four figures to publish in journals nobody reads and will hurt your career if spotted by a diligent cv reader!