The United States prices an enforceable photograph at 7.3 cents, rising to 11.3.

Start with the document, because the document is unusually plain. “Proposed Schedule and Analysis of Copyright Fees to Go into Effect in Fall 2026,” marked “Submitted to Congress July 14, 2026,” sets out the changes line by line. Group registration of published photographs: “to increase from $55 to $85.” Group registration of unpublished photographs, the same. The Standard Application, filed electronically, “to increase from $65 to $85.” The Single Application, which the Office had first proposed to abolish, survives: “we will retain this option for the time being with only a $10 increase,” from $45 to $55. The reason given is cost recovery: registration fees today recover “approximately 47% of the costs associated with providing registration services,” and the adjustments “would increase cost recovery to approximately 59%,” still under the Office’s historical target of about 60.

Now the date, which is the part nobody can print correctly. The authority is 17 U.S.C. § 708(b): “the Register of Copyrights may institute the new fees 120 days after the proposed schedule is submitted to Congress.” One hundred and twenty days from 14 July 2026 is 11 November 2026. The Office itself will not say it. Its fee-study page states that “the implementation date has not yet been finalized” and that “the Office will announce the effective date in a final rule to be published in the Federal Register,” committing only to “the fall of 2026.” The trade press has filled the vacuum with arithmetic: one outlet prints 11 November, another 12 November, a third “as early as mid-November.” The American Society of Media Photographers, to its credit, prints the caution instead: “The passage of that period is not an announcement that the fees have taken effect.”

Which brings the consensus into view, because it is organised, named and dated. On 5 October 2026, ASMP and the North American Nature Photography Association both published Tell the Copyright Office: Don’t Raise Registration Fees, charting the three increases at 55, 31 and 22 percent. On 14 July 2026, the day the schedule went to Congress, Alicia Calzada, Deputy General Counsel of the National Press Photographers Association, called it “deeply disappointing” and said the Office was “forcing photographers to bear the burden of inefficiency.” NPPA president Alex Garcia asked, “who will protect us from the copyright bureaucrats?” and called the schedule “a tax on the creative process.” Shira Perlmutter, Register of Copyrights, is going ahead.

Set against that, the Copyright Claims Board published its own census in April 2026, covering June 2022 to March 2026. 1,920 claims in 46 months — 41.74 a month for the whole United States. 787 of them, 40.9896%, “dismissed after compliance review.” Another 272 dismissed because “valid proof of service” was never filed. 168 respondents opted out. 155 settlements, 154 withdrawal requests, and 47 final determinations in total — 25 contested, 22 by default — which is 2.4479% of everything filed. 67% of claimants represented themselves. 36% of claims concern pictorial, graphic and sculptural works: photographs, mostly.

The consensus reading of those two documents is a single sentence: a small-claims tribunal that barely works is about to get more expensive to use. It is wrong in a specific and checkable way, and the error is arithmetic rather than political. The fee rise is a multiplication by 1.545455. It applies identically at every scale: a single photograph filed in a group costs $55 today and $85 after; 750 of them cost $0.0733333 and $0.1133333 each. The number nobody in the campaign has quoted is the other one. 37 CFR § 202.4(i) lets one application carry up to 750 photographs, so the per-photograph price inside a single filing ranges across 750× — from $85.00 down to $0.1133333 — and that range is set entirely by the person filling in the form. The lever the trade bodies are fighting is 1.545455×. The lever they are not mentioning is 485.29 times larger, and it belongs to the filer.

And it is open to anyone. 37 CFR § 202.3(c)(1): “an application for copyright registration may be submitted by any author or other copyright claimant of a work, the owner of any exclusive right in a work, or the duly authorized agent of any such author, other claimant, or owner.” No bar admission, no agent register, no examination, no bond — unlike patent practice, the Copyright Office keeps no roster of who may file. The product is not litigation and not advice. It is the assembly of a 750-image deposit, a title-and-file-name list in Excel or PDF, and a form, inside the window 17 U.S.C. § 412 opens: registration before the infringement begins, or within three months of first publication. § 410(d) settles the rest — registration is effective the day the application, deposit and fee all arrive, not the day the certificate issues, which the Office’s own figures put at an average of 3.4 months for cases closed between 1 April and 30 September 2026. The date stamp is the product.

So the trade is this. One posted market price exists for the service: $249 a group filing with the government fee included, against $149 for a single work. At $85, that leaves $164 a filing. $5,000 a month after 2026 federal tax is $78,212.05 of profit; with an assumed $1,800 fixed line that is $80,012.05 of contribution, 487.88 filings a year, 1.87 every working day — roughly 122 photographers filing quarterly. Before the rise the same money took 412.43 filings. The increase the campaign is fighting costs the operator 75.45 filings a year, 18.2927% more work; the batching decision it is not fighting is worth up to 750×.