Cuts to library spending

[emellaich]

I think we need to ask about the basic purpose of a library and what the government interest is in providing such a service. For example, why does the government provide me with free books and not with a free microwave oven?

In the really old days, books were hand-copied and literally rare. Today, that is not a problem and with e-books even less so. For me, the answer today is that education and literacy are necessary to personal advancement. Investment in a child's intellectual growth will pay off in government (tax) savings later in life.

In this regard, I would do everything necessary to beef up libraries in providing access to people who might otherwise be stuck in a downward spiral. This means books and internet access. It also means community events if it helps to make the library a place to hang out.

However, there is no reason for my tax dollars to pay for someone else to watch a free movie. And I can afford to pay authors for my own copies of books; I don't need to take your tax dollars to buy my books. I would have no problem with smaller libraries, or with library fees for patrons who are not low income.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by emellaich

I think we need to ask about the basic purpose of a library and what the government interest is in providing such a service. For example, why does the government provide me with free books and not with a free microwave oven?

In the really old days, books were hand-copied and literally rare. Today, that is not a problem and with e-books even less so. For me, the answer today is that education and literacy are necessary to personal advancement. Investment in a child's intellectual growth will pay off in government (tax) savings later in life.

In this regard, I would do everything necessary to beef up libraries in providing access to people who might otherwise be stuck in a downward spiral. This means books and internet access. It also means community events if it helps to make the library a place to hang out.

However, there is no reason for my tax dollars to pay for someone else to watch a free movie. And I can afford to pay authors for my own copies of books; I don't need to take your tax dollars to buy my books. I would have no problem with smaller libraries, or with library fees for patrons who are not low income.

I agree, but also think a fee like that would increase "class distinction" which is already becoming an increasing problem in much of U.S. society.

[tubemonkey]

The only thing I need from a public library is the ability to check out ebooks and audiobooks from the comfort of my home or mobile device. The rest of their services are irrelevant to me.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

The only thing I need from a public library is the ability to check out ebooks and audiobooks from the comfort of my home or mobile device. The rest of their services are irrelevant to me.

Well yeah, but when your illiterate neighbors attack your castle to kill you to get your wealth you might change your mind.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Well yeah, but when your illiterate neighbors attack your castle to kill you to get your wealth you might change your mind.

I belong to the NRA ...'nuff said

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

I belong to the NRA ...'nuff said

We'll hold 'em off together then!

[crich70]

Libraries also have other programs to help the community. Mine has places to help people from other countries (like Mexico for example) improve on their English and when I was a kid I took part in summer reading programs and field trips that they sponsored as a way of stimulating Children's minds. Plus for the very young there is story time at the library. As for the way libraries are organized it's done that way so you don't have to go looking all over the entire place to find one book. Fiction in one area and non-fiction in another. Fiction divided by Genre and author and Non-fiction by topic and author name. Without the Dewey Decimal System no one would be able to find anything save by pure luck. I always loved going to the library as a kid. I got my first library card at age 3 and have had one since.

[kennyc]

Has the internet replaced the library and is it a good or bad thing?

[mldavis2]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

The only thing I need from a public library is the ability to check out ebooks and audiobooks from the comfort of my home or mobile device. The rest of their services are irrelevant to me.

I see public access as making resources available to those who cannot afford those resources on their own. My wife, for example, grew up in abject poverty on a dry-land farm and cattle ranch in the Texas panhandle. Her school class had 9 members, so you can imagine that there was no library. A bookmobile came through about once a month to the school and she was able to check out an armload of books to take home to read. Her family could never afford to buy books, nor was there a local source, and a monthly library fee might not have been met, had there been a library within driving distance.

Books saved her from economic obscurity. She read everything she could, made it to college after borrowing heavily for tuition, and came out with a PhD after some incredible hardships and sacrifice. To this day, she says it was the availability of free books that gave her the head start over her non-reading classmates.

Electronic book availability is fantastic, but you have to have some means of reading them. Not everyone can afford a computer or eReader. Our rural library purchased two eReaders that can be checked out, but at $160 each and a $2.00 per day 'rental' fee, it's not for everyone. How fragile are eReaders in the hands of children or renters? Will the $2 fee cover replacement if/when they wear out or are damaged? Dunno.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by mldavis2

I see public access as making resources available to those who cannot afford those resources on their own.

No problem with that.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by mldavis2

I see public access as making resources available to those who cannot afford those resources on their own. My wife, for example, grew up in abject poverty on a dry-land farm and cattle ranch in the Texas panhandle. Her school class had 9 members, so you can imagine that there was no library. A bookmobile came through about once a month to the school and she was able to check out an armload of books to take home to read. Her family could never afford to buy books, nor was there a local source, and a monthly library fee might not have been met, had there been a library within driving distance.

Books saved her from economic obscurity. She read everything she could, made it to college after borrowing heavily for tuition, and came out with a PhD after some incredible hardships and sacrifice. To this day, she says it was the availability of free books that gave her the head start over her non-reading classmates.

Electronic book availability is fantastic, but you have to have some means of reading them. Not everyone can afford a computer or eReader. Our rural library purchased two eReaders that can be checked out, but at $160 each and a $2.00 per day 'rental' fee, it's not for everyone. How fragile are eReaders in the hands of children or renters? Will the $2 fee cover replacement if/when they wear out or are damaged? Dunno.

[mldavis2]

Sometimes it is difficult for those of us who are able to obtain the electronic devices to remember that there are so many who cannot. I live in the SW corner of Missouri, on the edge of the Ozarks, an area similar to the rural areas of Kentucky, South Carolina, West Virginia, etc. where many people struggle to find jobs and pay bills. I'm preaching to the choir here in stating how important reading and literature is to intellectual development in children, especially; and unless and until electronic eReaders become universally affordable, pBooks and libraries are extremely important resources to guarantee freedom of thought and the educational basis of a voting public (Jefferson, et. al.)

Back on topic here, any cuts to library spending will be counter-productive, whether it's to purchase fewer eBooks or pBooks or fire librarians. We cannot rely on students in our schools to voluntarily make use of library facilities until we make them readily and freely available and train them how to use them. If we eliminate instructors and require ownership of the electronic media with which to access our growing literary database, we are failing at ground zero. @kennyc is right-on in pointing out the widening class distinction gap. We all benefit from libraries, whether we use them as such or not.

[kennyc]

Perhaps an ebook manufacturer (Sony, Amazon, Google) should create a "literacy program" to distribute free ebook readers with access to libraries.....

[Hellmark]

Google is an manufacturer of ebook readers now?

[kennyc]

No, but .... they could be....maybe should be....