New York Times bestseller list is biased against conservatives: study
NY Post
The New York Times bestseller list is less likely to include works published by conservative authors even if their books posted sales figures that matched those of left-leaning writers, according to a study.
An analysis conducted by the Economist magazine found that books published by conservative printing houses are 7% less likely to make it onto the Gray Lady’s weekly bestseller list even if those books sell at the same rate as works put out by other publishers.
While leading conservative authors such as Bill O’Reilly and Glenn Beck are frequently listed on the Times’ bestseller non-fiction list, less prominent writers have a more difficult time making the cut, according to the Economist.
The magazine found that among book titles that sell fewer than 5,000 copies per week, those from conservative authors are much less likely to crack the Times’ bestseller list.
Those books that make the bottom 10 of the top 25 slots on Publishers Weekly’s bestselling non-fiction list in any given week are 22% less likely to be listed in a similar slot on the Times’ bestseller list, the Economist found.
The analysis also found that conservative authors who do manage to get their work touted on the Times’ bestseller list for non-fiction rank on average 2.3 notches below other authors with similar sales figures.
