A significant amount of the acquisition budget of a typical university library is spent on subscriptions to scholarly journals. Over the last several years, the average subscription rate a library pays for such a journal has increased dramatically, even though the costs of publishing a scholarly journal have remained fairly constant. Obviously, then, in most cases publishing a scholarly journal must be much more profitable now than it was several years ago. Which one of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument?
A: Many university libraries have begun to charge higher and higher fines for overdue books and periodicals as a way of passing on increased journal subscription costs to library users.
B: Publishing a scholarly journal is an expensive enterprise, and publishers of such journals cannot survive financially if they consistently lose money.
C: The majority of scholarly journals are published no more than four times a year.
D: Most subscribers to scholarly journals are individuals, not libraries, and the subscription rates for individuals have generally remained unchanged for the past several years.
Choose A, B, C or D as your solution.
D