Using the contingent valuation method to measure patron benefits of reference desk service in an academic library

College and Research Libraries

Volumn 60, Issue 1, 1999, Pages 56-69

  Harless, David W ^a   Allen, Frank R ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0032622166     PISSN: 00100870     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.5860/crl.60.1.56     Document Type: Article

References (28)

1. Karen S. Summerhill, "The High Cost of Reference: The Need to Reassess Services and Service Delivery," Reference Librarian 43 (1994): 71-85.
2. Marjorie E. Murfin, "Cost Analysis of Library Reference Services," in Advances in Library Administration and Organization, ed. Gerald B. McCabe and Bernard Kreissman (Greenwich, Conn.: JAI Pr., 1993), 1-36.
3. Keith Ewing et al, "Symposium on Reference Service. Is Traditional Reference Service Obsolete? [and] other," Journal of Academic Librarianship, 21, no.1 (Jan. 1995): 3-25.
4. James R. Kuhiman , "On the Economics of Reference Service: Toward a Heuristic Model for an Uncertain World," Reference Librarian 49/50 (1995): 25-43.
5. Murfin., "Cost Analysis of Library Reference Services."
6. Paul B. Kantor et al, Studying the Cost and Value of Library Services Final Report (New Brunswick, N. J.: Alexandria Project Laboratory, School of Communication, Information and Library Studies, Rutgers, State Univ. of New Jersey, 1995).
7. Paul B. Kantor, "What Bang for the Buck: Costs and Beneficial Impacts of Library Operations," in The Economics of Information in the 1990's, ed. Jana Varlejs (Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland and Co., Inc. Publishers, 1995), 24-44.
8. Kantor et al report on the distribution of WTP for a single use of any library service or resource, but the authors were unable to find a separately reported WTP for an instance of reference desk service.
9. Burton A. Weisbrod, "Collective Consumption Services of Individual-Consumption Goods," Quarterly Journal of Economics 78, no. 3 (Aug. 1964): 471-77.
10. Richard C. Bishop, "Option Value: An Exposition and Extension," Land Economics 58, no. 1 (Feb. 1982): 1-15.
11. Daniel A. Graham, "Cost-Benefit Analysis Under Uncertainty," American Economic Review 71, no. 4 (Sept. 1981): 715-25.
12. V. Kerry Smith, "Option Value: A Conceptual Overview," Southern Economic Journal 49, no. 1 (Jan. 1983): 654-68.
13. V. Kerry Smith, "Uncertainty, Benefit-Cost Analysis, and the Treatment of Option Value," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management 14, no.3 (Sept. 1987): 283-92.
14. A more careful statement would indicate that uncertainty must exist and markets are "incomplete" so that, for example, we cannot buy an actuarially fair insurance policy that pays an amount sufficient to obtain reference advice in the event we require it.
15. Horst O. Nourse, "Effect of Air Pollution on House Values," Land Economics 43, no. 2 (May 1967): 181-89.
16. Ronald G. Ridker and John A. Henning, "Determinants of Residential Property Values with Special Reference to Air Pollution," Review of Economics and Statistics 49, no.2 (May 1967): 246-57.
17. Robert K. Davis, "Recreation Planning as an Economic Problem," Natural Resources Journal 3, no. 2 (1963): 239-49
18. Murfin, "Cost Analysis of Library Reference Service," 27.
19. Robert C. Mitchell and Richard T. Carson, Using Public Surveys to Value Public Goods: Contingent Valuation Method (Washington, D.C.: Resources for the Future, 1989), 2.
20. Christopher H. Green et al, "Economic Evaluation of Environmental Goods," Project Appraisal 5 (1990): 70-82.
21. Stale Navrud, Pricing the European Environment, (Oxford, Eng: Oxford Univ. Pr., 1992).
22. Mitchell and Carscn, Using Public Surveys to Value Public Goods, appendix B.
23. The authors regarded the response "Don't know" as equivalent to refusing to answer.
24. Peter J. Bickel, and Kjell A. Doksum, Mathematical Statistics: Ideas and Concepts (San Francisco: Holden-Day, 1977).
25. Steven M. Stigler, "Do Robust Estimators Work with Real Data," Annals of Statistics 5 (1977): 1055-98.
26. Mitchell and Carscn, Using Public Surveys to Value Public Goods, 34.
27. In cost-benefit analysis for a government policymaker, an adjustment is made for taxes because the government also receives revenue from taxes; here, the circumstances are different because the authors perform a cost-benefit analysis for the university and hence use the wages inclusive of employer-paid taxes.
28. Two assumptions may tend to understate actual costs. It was assumed that the library would pay the same wage and salary rate for staff who worked extended hours as for those who work current hours. It also was assumed that the library would not increase overall library staffing to provide the extended hours but would internally reallocate staff from other departments and shifts. If the library increased overall staff levels, it would incur additional costs of office space, training, equipmert, and supplies.