Somewhat tangential to the main article, but I have a hunch (as yet uncontaminated by hard evidence) that some sizable fraction of the decline in writerly fortunes over the last hundred years or so is that even though literate audience has expanded tremendously, barely any of them have enough leisure time to actually read for pleasure. I doubt more leisure time would make 'short story writer' a potentially lucrative career path again like it was in the 20's, but it'd be interesting to see a comparison with the market in Western Europe, adjusted for the much smaller market size of each of its component national languages.