Are you ready for the beginning of the end of content mills that pay writers peanuts? Good, because it happened this week: Demand Studios announced that it is going to start offering some sort of healthcare plan to its freelancers. Details are yet to come — Demand is supposed to say more in November.

This news is like the shot heard ’round the online writing world. Because here’s what it means: We’ve hit the bottom and now these writer sites are headed back up again.

There’s enough competition out there for good writers that Demand felt a need to offer a perk — something the other writing sites didn’t have. Competition being what it is, this will likely be countered by another improvement at another site, and so on, hopefully until rates become more in line with a living wage. Where we’ve been in a race to the bottom the past few years, now that scenario is turning around. And it’s about time.

I would imagine that given the state of healthcare in this country, there’ll be a stampede to Demand by writers who write for other mills. After all, if you’re the type of writer who’s willing to write for one of these sites, why should you write anywhere else? Freelancers are always so hard-pressed to find healthcare.

Demand’s very savvy to put that on the table. It also helps them forestall the inevitable, which is going to be higher rates, maybe at first just for the best and most qualified, but probably eventually for everyone.

Obviously, we’ve got a long way to go, but this is a very promising development. There’s still ultra-low paying mills such as Amazon Mechanical Turk. One social-media expert I recently interviewed told me she teaches her clients to go to this site and pay $.25 an article for content. I about threw up.

But Demand has thrown down the gauntlet — the field is crowded, and the only way to distinguish your site in future will be to offer writers a better situation. The economy is turning, and the pool of people willing to write for $10 an article or less — in America, anyway — is about to start drying up. Hallelujah.

Can’t wait to see who ups the ante next.

What do you think of Demand’s move? Leave a comment and let me know.