Ohio economists: Cutting library funding will reduce ‘human capital,' hurt the economy
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PARMA HEIGHTS, OH — JANUARY 26: Ukrainians Marta and Taras Chaban who fled the violence of the war pose for a portrait at the library where they take English classes twice a week, January 26, 2023, at the Cuyahoga County Public Library - Parma Heights Branch, in Parma Heights, Ohio. (Photo by Graham Stokes for Ohio Capital Journal)
A panel of economists overwhelmingly said that if federal and state cuts to public library funding become reality, it will harm 'human capital' — knowledge and skill that can be used as an economic resource. A smaller majority said it would also reduce the state's economic output.
The budget proposed by the Republican-controlled Ohio House would spend almost $91 million less on public libraries than the draft proposed by Gov. Mike DeWine, reports the Ohio Library Council.
'Additionally, the Ohio House changed how library funding is allocated,' the library council said last month. 'Instead of receiving 1.7% of the state's General Revenue Fund (GRF)—as established in permanent law—the Public Library Fund (PLF) would become a line-item appropriation. This change could put future library funding at greater risk, as line-item appropriations are more vulnerable to elimination.'
In addition, a group led by Elon Musk, the world's richest man, has moved to eliminate the Institute of Museum and Library Services, a federal grant-making agency with a budget of $290 million a year.
Benjamin Franklin in 1731 'invented the library as we know it,' Smithsonian Magazine reported last year. That's when he founded the Library Company of Philadelphia, which was cheap enough for average people to join and improve themselves.
Franklin himself was self-taught and would go on to be the most famous American in the world. He knew that access to books and other materials had vast potential as an improving, democratizing force.
'These libraries have improved the general conversation of the Americans,' Smithsonian Magazine quoted Franklin as saying. And they 'made the common tradesmen and farmers as intelligent as most gentlemen from other countries.'
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In 1833, the first completely tax-supported library opened in New Hampshire. Between 1886 and 1919, industrialist Andrew Carnegie put up money to open more than 1,600 public libraries, then nearly half of the free public libraries in the United States. More than 100 of the Carnegie libraries opened in Ohio.
'A library outranks any other one thing a community can do to benefit its people,' the Ohio History Connection quotes Carnegie as saying. 'It is a never failing spring in the desert.'
As did Franklin, Carnegie believed that public libraries were fundamental to a functioning democracy.
'There is not such a cradle of democracy upon the earth as the free public library, this republic of letters, where neither rank, office, nor wealth receives the slightest consideration,' he said.
Not able to afford college, future President Harry Truman was a voracious reader of American history. He later claimed that by the time he was 14, he had read every book in the Independence, Mo., Public Library.
'Not all readers become leaders,' Truman said. 'But all leaders must be readers.'
In 2025, public libraries offer more than books. They're an important economic resource, especially for underserved Americans, the American Library Association said last month.
'Public libraries are essential infrastructure in every American community, and that especially is so during times of economic uncertainty,' the group said. 'The elimination of federal funding for public libraries will be felt in every community across the country, and particularly in rural areas. Public libraries provide people with job skills training, entrepreneurship support, homeschooling and education materials, and access to food services that are at risk without federal funding. As many people face job reductions and layoffs, there is an increased need for the services libraries provide to help people improve workforce skills.'
In Ohio, Scioto Analysis put several questions about library funding to a panel of 14 economists.
Asked if 'cutting funding from Ohio's public libraries will reduce human capital development of Ohio residents,' 11 said it would, one said it wouldn't and two were uncertain.
In the comments section of the survey, Kevin Egan of the University of Toledo spoke of weekly library visits with his kids.
'Every time we went to the public library it was full of citizens utilizing its resources: many different types of human capital development beyond just reading, including public access to computers for online job applications and resume preparation; study rooms for students to prepare for their classes and do homework, helpful staff to locate whatever you are interested in learning,' Egan wrote.
The only economist who said cutting library funding would not sap human capital was David Brasington of the University of Cincinnati.
'Other sources of information have made libraries redundant or replaced them,' he wrote.
A strong majority of the economists also agreed that 'cutting funding from Ohio's public libraries will reduce statewide economic output in the long run.'
Nine agreed, two disagreed and three were uncertain.
'I'm not clear how much libraries will increase economic output, and it is probably hard to measure, but I'm sure they help at least a little bit,' said Jonathan Andreas of Bluffton University. 'This was one reason Andrew Carnegie spent a large portion of his fortune on libraries.'
Brasington strongly disagreed.
'Libraries are increasingly irrelevant in the information age,' he said.
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