Invidious though it may be, I would like to single out one opinion from this afternoon’s plenary session debates. ‘Book publishing on the move,’ is an own-initiative opinion (rapporteur = Grace Attard, Various Interests Group/Malta; co-rapporteur = Hilde van Laere, Employers Group delegate/Belgium) produced by the EESC’s Consultative Commission on Industrial Change. I learnt a lot from this wide-ranging opinion. The publishing industry is a prime example of a sector undergoing profound change as a result of technological advances and changing cultural habits, with knock-on effects for economies and jobs. Attard’s opinion bows to the inevitable, in that it acknowledges that these changes are here to stay, necessitating all sorts of adaptations. But I was interested to learn that there are almost inadvertent discriminatory fiscal regimes that favour online books against the printed version. In the US, for example, online publishing is tax-free. We should hardly be surprised that sales of Kindles and electronic books have rocketed!
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