Maybe we should. These days, public libraries are little more than homeless shelters. I haven't been to one in at least 5 years for that reason, and printed books are largely irrelevant in today's world anyway.
Museums could be operated by private non-profits and foundations. No need to have taxpayers directly finance their construction.
The library near me is wonderful, and my wife regularly goes there just because of how peaceful it is and how broad their e-book collection is for her bus rides. I'm in a normal no-name township, nothing particularly wealthy. Same goes for the library where I grew up, and from visits back, it's in about the same state. Volunteer work there was integral to my growing up, and accessibility to the books there was 100% of the reason I became such an avid reader.
Just because you don't like libraries, and you may have seen some bad ones, doesn't mean you should seek to remove one of the remaining bastions of government services that purely serve to better the quality of life accessible to all. (I'd cite PBS as well)
I'd say the same about museums. To abscond from a public duty to educate and provide information, we religate ourselves to the unfortunately trend of a citizenship lacking in critical thinking and inquisitiveness.
If govt spending is such a key issue, it's mind-boggling that one would focus on such trivial non-%'s as opposed to the largest allocations, of which there are MANY well-discussed inefficiencies.
I live in a wealthy (high COL, at least) area, and I see what the GP referred to.
Housing here is very expensive, ergo, living spaces are small, so I tried to go to the library to get some "real studying" done on my own time — every time the city library was slap full (all booths and chairs occupied) with 95% homeless folk.
I love and appreciate city run libraries but IME they are directly suffering from the lack of social support and affordable housing to that portion of the population.
(me: lives in West Los Angeles/Beach Cities area)
However I now live in NYC, the city that never sleeps, and can’t believe that local libraries in Manhattan are generally open 10am-6pm making them hard for students to visit if they have extra-curricular activities and nearly impossible for anyone working to ever take advantage. The hours alone seem to indicate the libraries are mostly for the retired or unemployed.
I'm in a normal no-name township
If so many people have such a problem with homeless people in libraries, maybe their city needs more homeless shelters that serve the same needs. I mean, they camp out under bridges and overpasses as well, should we demolish the roads too?
Odd, I've been in plenty of public libraries, and I've been able to access a number of useful services in them, and none have been homeless shelters, either literally or figuratively.
> and printed books are largely irrelevant in today's world anyway
No they're not, no more than movies, television, radio, or any other form of media that exists despite digital media.
Maybe your personal, limited experience doesn't scale up to a general view of human culture as well as you think it does.
Our print book circulation remains strong regardless of other electronic services we provide. There are millions of books that never get e-book versions.
Most museums and public libraries are indeed operated with non-profit organizations responsible to the local government authority (including mine).
You should get yourself into a library as soon as possible.
One can probably run it more efficiently as an Internet access room at a local community center, with access to printing/faxing/tutoring/resume building and other services.
And, just as you said, some zip codes will benefit from this setup more than others.
And heck, with what happened recently, neither can Professional people who are minorities and look like they don’t belong....
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/apr/16/arrest-of-tw...
This was totally false at each of the five public libraries that I've visited over the last two years.