Scripts to streamline/enforce the copy and publish subdir method (https://stackoverflow.com/a/39946795/2234013). idk if copying package.json is necessary

npm-publish-dist-scripts.json

{
    "prepublishOnly": "if [[ ! $PWD =~ dist$ ]]; then npm run _dist:nopublish; fi",
    "_dist:nopublish": "echo 'Use `npm run dist` instead of `npm publish`!' && exit 1",
    "_dist:prep": "yarn build && cp package.json dist && cp README.md dist",
    "_dist:post": "rm -f dist/package.json && rm -f dist/README.md",
    "dist": "npm run _dist:prep && npm publish dist && npm run _dist:post"
}

Same for me here - @sandrina-p 's fix did the trick for me.
And, after that, you just need to npm publish <tar>, where tar is the tar ball generated from npm pack ./dist