Public libraries´ services and their economic evaluation

Abstract

The goal of public library is to meet the cultural, educational, and social demands and requests of local society by providing information services to their residents. Economic valuation of public libraries is being carried out more frequently in recent times. Since the mid-nineties researchers attempted to quantify the value of library services and asked users of these services for their opinions regarding the performance of public libraries. The economic value of public libraries for local residents in Czech Republic was measured in this paper. Data for the analysis were collected from 37 public libraries in the Czech Republic. The public libraries’ benefit/cost ratio was calculated and it is 5,86 – 6,17 %. That means, for every USD 1.00 spent on analyzing Czech public libraries, provides on average USD 6.00 benefit value to taxpayers. The resulting value (USD 6.00) is quite comparable to results from similar studies conducted in other developed countries. It was also found that the library size does not affect the final value of the public libraries services, thus the efficiency of spent public funds is comparable in both large and small libraries.