In these journals, the editor sends submitted articles out to persons expert in the field of the article. The referee comments on the article and the research it presents. The editor then decides whether to accept the article as is, send it back to the author for revision, or reject it outright. Note that electronic processing methods, such as e-mail of manuscripts between authors, editors and referees is speeding up the process. As research grows, both scholarly societies and commercial publishers increase the number and size of journals.
Prices increase even faster.
More pages per issue, more volumes per year. Costs of paper, printing increase, often dramatically. Currency exchange rates can have a drastic effect. Repeat until the journal dies. And, in some cases, publisher rapacity.