Members of the Writers Guild of America, those people who write streaming series like Bridgerton, Ted Lasso and Game of Thrones, are on strike. Here's one big reason: The writers want to be paid more when more people view what they have written.

Way back when, soon after publication of my first novel, I checked the online catalog of the Palo Alto City Library and saw that over 80 patrons had reserved it. What was my reaction? "Go without a few lattes, you penny pinchers, and buy the darn thing — it's only $13.95."

Maybe we book writers should go on strike, too, just like the screenwriters. We certainly could use a few extra cents each time one of our books is checked out of the library. Sure, the net worth of J.K. Rowling or James Patterson might be close to a billion dollars. But let's get real. A survey of full-time U.S. authors showed they earned a median income of $23,329 in 2022 with only about half coming from book royalties.

Legislators in 34 countries have taken a step toward increasing pay for authors with something called a "public lending right." In the U.K., for example, each time a book is checked out of a public library, the author receives around 38 cents paid for by the national government. You think that might bankrupt His Majesty's Treasury? The PLR scheme is not designed to make Jo Rowling (no, it doesn't apply to Americans) even richer. Authors under the U.K. plan are limited to payments of around $8,000 per year. Under our northern neighbor's PLR program, more than 18,000 Canadian authors are compensated annually with payments ranging from $50 to $4,500 a year. Not a lot, but those sums will make a difference to many new writers. Computerized checkouts ease gathering the information on which books are checked out.

I'm not suggesting a subsidy here. It's payment for services provided. Writers should be paid when their books are read. That's fairness, not a subsidy. Abraham Lincoln said, "All I have learned, I learned from books." Let's keep the authors of those books compensated and writing.

The U.S. government will run a deficit of $1.6 trillion (!) this fiscal year, and adding billions to it would be a distasteful prospect. No fear. The annual cost of a PLR program is about $8 million in the U.K. and $17 million in Germany. On a pro rata basis, it would cost less than $100 million in the U.S. It might then add 0.0063% to the deficit, truly no more than rounding error.

So let's get this straight. Libraries buy books. The national government pays writers a small sum each time a book is checked out. Writers make a little extra money from people reading their books. (Writers making money? Call the police!) A great idea? I think so. And not that expensive either, especially considering the benefits. As John F. Kennedy said, "If this nation is to be wise as well as strong, if we are to achieve our destiny, then we need more new ideas for more wise men reading more good books in more public libraries."

I am rooting for those writers who believe they should earn more money when viewers watch their shows via a streaming service. I'm rooting even harder for writers to make more money when readers read their books checked out of the library.

In 1983, Maryland's Republican Senator Charles Mathias introduced Senate Bill 2192 to establish a commission to evaluate a system "for compensating authors for the public lending of their books." Forty years of waiting is long enough. Why not write your senators and representatives about a public lending right for American authors? It's a small price to pay for a more literate society.

In Keith Raffel's checkered past, he has served as the senior counsel to the Senate Intelligence Committee, started an award-winning internet software company and written five novels, which you can check out at keithraffel.com. He currently spends the academic year as a resident scholar at Harvard. To find out more about Keith and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators website at creators.com.

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