How much should you pay your editors? This question, of course, is a complex one -- there are countless variables associated with editorial salary. These include, but are not limited to:

--Experience

--Number of employees and/or publications supervised

--Geographic area

--Job title/responsibilities

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics May 2008 report, there are approximately 110,000 editors in the United States, earning an average salary of $57,180 per year ($27.49/hour). A majority of these editors (66,780, to be exact) work for newspaper, periodical, book, and directory publishers.

Compensation Policy

Once you've analyzed a few salary surveys and have a general idea of the averages, there are still several additional factors to consider, including the job market, confidentiality of salaries, and the relationships between salaries for different editorial jobs. You should aim to make effective, informed decisions when determining how much to compensate your editors. Not only should you offer potential new hires an attractive salary, but you should also avoid the costly mistake of losing valuable employees due to under-compensation.

Confidentiality

Should salaries be treated as privileged information? If your compensation system includes an element of preferentiality (i.e., nepotism, intra-office friendships, or subjective performance reviews), it would be advisable to keep those numbers under wraps. Otherwise, the preferential pay scale can prove demoralizing to "non-preferred" staff members.

Salary Administration

There are two key devices that will help you to make salary-related decisions: a written job description and a regular job appraisal, or performance review. The job description will provide written support if you are withholding a pay raise due to poor performance. The job appraisal will allow you to touch base with employees and review performance, setting development goals for the next appraisal. Not only will this promote understanding and harmony, but it will make salary administration work for the overall good of your publication.

For more information about this topic, including more statistics from the May 2008 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics report and Folio's 2008 editorial salary report, read our special report: Editorial Salaries.