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The very title of Hajdu’s book hints at the core of the problem: The Ten-Cent Plague was, indeed, a disaster related to pricing. Comics were inexpensive so that children could buy them. As costs rose, rather than raising the price, publishers cut the package, stripping away pages to continue selling at a dime to children. Dell, never a code member, lost its status as market leader when they finally raised their price, and they never recovered (television undoubtedly hit them hardest of all publishers as well). The comic book industry fell in the 1950s because it myopically chased the dimes of children, and only children, unable to even conceptualize another market.
