LOCHABER no more. Sutherland no more. Young Scots heading abroad to find their fortune – or, at least, more fortune than at home – is a recurring theme.

The fact Scotland is again experiencing a youth exodus might come as news to few. The population of Scots aged 18 to 30 has shrunk by 5% over the past decade. This is well ahead of the Office of National Statistics’ general trend for the UK, which is seeing young people pursuing opportunities elsewhere.

However, it is in Scotland’s rural communities that this has been far more pronounced, and where youth are more predisposed to leaving. With a rise in ­rural primary schools being shuttered over the past five years, the effects of ageing and depopulation are clear to see.

There are parts of the country which are asking: Where did all the young people go? And will they be back?

Scotland ageing faster than the rest of the UK

Of the 10 fastest-ageing places in the United Kingdom, seven are found in Scotland. Since 2001, the median age in Argyll and Bute, Dumfries and Galloway, and the Scottish Borders has increased by nine years.

According to a recent study of mid-year population estimates by think tank the Resolution Foundation, this is largely due to a quirk of Scottish geography.

“The UK’s fastest-ageing places over the past 20 years are all coastal or rural areas, and many are in Scotland,” says report author Charlie McCurdy.

Read the full article on The National website here: PART ONE.

The Scottish islands putting the brakes on the rural youth exodus

THE empty cliffs of St Kilda are a monument in black basalt. They’re as dramatic a landmark for boat trippers as they are a reminder of lost island communities.

Croft houses abandoned for a less precarious existence, anywhere else. The empty, stone cleits belong to Scotland’s best-known “ghost town” of Hirta.

Though there are tens of similar islands that were emptied by residents in the last hundred years. Novelist John Buchan had the romantic view that land in these islands should be awarded to ­patriotic Scots serving in the First World War.

Instead, the war only served to accelerate depopulation. By the 1930s, Buchan too had left Scotland for Canada, like so many of the crofters he wrote about in his ­adventure stories.

One hundred years later, in the era of “work from ­anywhere”, satellite internet and instant connectivity, these crofting islands still seem beyond the pale.

Nobody has tried to repopulate St Kilda, which now belongs to the National Trust of Scotland. It’s ­unlikely we’ll see an Airbnb or kombucha distillery appear on Hirta any time soon.

There is, however, a new ­generation of Scottish transplants, who are ­trying to turn the tide on this old story of ­depopulation. Some trace their roots back to previous generations of ­crofters, some are drawn by the romance of ­making a near-lost lifestyle work for them. In either case they are swimming against the long-term trend that has seen islands empty.

Read the full article on The National website here: PART TWO.

900 writers on how they got the job and what they charged.

Introduction

What’s a word worth? It’s a question many freelance journalists and writers will ask themselves. While some publications pay per article or, increasingly, hourly reporting rates (with minimum story turnovers), ‘per word’ remains the standard unit that determines the economy of any assignment. 

Working out where will give you the most for a word sounds like the premise of a boardgame, not a serious occupation. Still, there is potentially a huge difference in fee from different outlets, for the same article. 

Different publishers tend to have different agreed rates for a pitch. They are also likely to commission different styles and lengths of copy. Unlike Scrabble, you can’t game the system but you can get a better idea of the going rate from different publications, and what is a fair fee to accept.

The UK National Union of Journalists says the generic rate for print news should be £0.60 to £1.00 a word. For online articles it’s half that, at £0.30 to £0.40 per word. 

However in the era of online news and copy mills, there’s a surprising lack of standard pay rates and an even larger gulf between top and bottom rates. There is an incentive to keep it that way. 

There have been attempts to peer behind this imbalance, most recently by the “#FreelancerPayGap”. In 2020 writer Anna Codrea-Rado published a Google Form via her Substack “A-Mail” asking for fellow journos to anonymously submit their most recent commissions. It was part of a collaboration with copywriter Alex Holder into the pay rates in different creative industries. 

As an ongoing self-reported survey, it asks writers to detail the number of words, pay and type of work from a job. More importantly it asks questions on experience, gender and how the work was commissioned – in case these factors affect a writer’s bottom line.

With almost 1000 responses, the spreadsheet is a great resource and is still taking submissions.  

While the data is all self submitted, and far from perfect, I wanted to dive into the results to see if I could answer some of the most common freelance FAQs on money. Does experience pay? Is there a gender pay gap amongst freelancers?

And, most importantly, which magazines pay the best per word?

To help compare all data reported by freelancers, I have standardised fees to US$ per word, while also sharing the maximum and minimum range for fees and word counts.