This study compares the overall spending trends and patterns of growth of Academic Libraries with Public Libraries, K-12 schools, higher education institutions, and hospitals in the period of 1998 to 2008. Academic Libraries, while showing a growth of 13% over inflation for the period, far underperformed the growth of the other public institutions…

Information on the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) data survey is presented, along with a quantitative index for the university libraries of the Association of American Universities (AAU). Ten quantitative measures of holdings, expenditures, and staff size for the AAU libraries from the 1981-1982 annual ARL survey are converted to an index…

A study was conducted to examine library data and trends among a group of 42 liberal arts colleges known as the "Bowdoin List." Questionnaires were completed and returned by 35 of the colleges, and interviews were conducted with the library directors at 22 of the colleges. The first of 10 sections in this report presents the statistical…

Describes a model enumerating cost factors for comparing costs for paper, online, and CD-ROM indexes and abstracts. The model is applied to start-up and annual costs, and to the cost of storing and providing access to ERIC, Applied Science and Fisheries Abstracts, and Excerpta Medica, based on anticipated academic library usage. (MBR)

Investigates costs and operations of back office activities of three middle-sized research libraries focusing on costs of labor and effects of automation. Measuring costs, labor compensation differences, differences in hours per volume, differences in organization, reduction of labor costs due to automation, and the quality dimension are…