Title pretty much says it all. Why do magazines use freelance writers rather than hiring editors/writers to write all the content of the magazine? I gather that there’s no lack of aspiring young writers who would happily work for peanuts at their favorite magazine, so why pay freelancers?
I’m not talking specialty magazines, where you want experts in a field writing in-depth articles. I’m talking general magazines - the “Woman’s Day” and “Good Housekeeping” type magazines.
Money. Maintaining a staff of writers costs money, and it’s cheaper to pay freelance writers for occasional articles than to pay them a salary plus benefits.
For the freelancers, it gives them the ability to write for multiple magazines on their own schedule. If they worked for a single magazine or a single company, they’d have to take whatever assignments they’re given. If they freelance, they can pick and choose which to take and when.
Robin
Same reason offices hire temps-it’s cheaper.
No benefits to pay, no hiring, training, or retention costs, and you don’t have to pay them if there’s a slow period and there’s not much to work on.
Also, they can get a wider variety of writers that way than by keeping an entire staff on hand.
Abundance of low-cost, fresh material, no need for perks or benefits.
What she said.
However, some of our articles are written by on-staff editors, associate editors, etc. But probably half are from freelancers, usually the same people (editors’ pets) over and over.