[cstross]

They are paid a meagre sum per book (a dollar, maybe?) so they really don't care about the price other than that it is as low as possible to stimulate sales

Wrong.

We are paid a royalty which is a percentage cut of the sale price. Often a percentage of the net receipts the publisher gets for the books. So amazon's tactics come directly out of our pockets.

Hachette do not pay authors "a very low and fixed sum". We're in a profit-sharing arrangement with them. No profits for Hachette? No profits for the authors, either.

Please refrain from disseminating information on HN about a business you aren't actively involved in without first engaging in some fact-checking.

(Disclaimer: I am a full-time professional author and Hachette is one of my publishers in the UK.)