DOAJ’s Financial Pickle
Expenses have been rising faster than revenues, so everyone is going to pay more
Earlier this month, the DOAJ issued a statement indicating plans to improve their sustainability — in other words, to increase revenues and cut expenses in order to address financial problems they’re experiencing.
These problems become clear when you chart their revenues and expenses over the past four years. While revenues have increased, administrative costs and other expenses (not shown as they are relatively minor) have increased faster, draining the small pot of retained earnings the organization has accumulated:
It is a surprisingly fragile situation, with only 10% of their historical revenues preserved in total. After 20 years of existence, you might expect retained earnings to have accumulated into a decent “rainy day” fund. That is not the case.