How to calculate a personal cost-benefit analysis for the Ontario Library Service

Short version:

To calculate how much actual money you pay to support the Ontario Library Service, multiply line 428 of your tax return * 0.00003181673.

Full version:

Last year, I calculated a personal cost-benefit analysis of the tax dollars that I, personally, pay in support of my local public library.

In the wake of recent cuts, I was going to write up a personal cost-benefit analysis for the Ontario Library Service, but before I could do so, the Toronto Public Library announced that these cuts wouldn't affect their services.

However, there is much more to Ontario than just Toronto, and the differences in population and population density mean libraries in many other parts of Ontario have smaller collections (and therefore need more interlibrary loans) and smaller municipal tax bases (and therefore are more dependent on provincial funding.)

So, for everyone else in Ontario, here's how to calculate your own cost-benefit analysis of the Ontario Library Service.

Ontario's total revenue for the 2017-2018 fiscal year was $150.6 billion.

The Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport's 2017-2018 funding for Ontario Library Service North was $1,645,800, and for the Southern Ontario Library Service was $3,145,800.

$1,645,800 + $3,145,800 =  $4,791,600 in total funding for the Ontario Library Service.

$4,791,600 / $150.6 billion = 0.00003181673.  This is the portion of your provincial taxes that support the Ontario Library Service. (If you prefer percentages, that's approximately 0.003%)  

The amount you paid in provincial taxes can be found on line 428 of your tax return.

Therefore:

To calculate how much actual money you pay to support the Ontario Library Service, multiply line 428 of your tax return * 0.00003181673

To calculate the amount saved by the recent cuts, divide this number by 2.

Then you can look at the resulting dollar amount and see how it compares with the library services you use over a year.

You can also look at how this will add up over your lifetime, and how that will compare with the library services you use over your lifetime.

If you don't want to do the math yourself:

I, personally, pay $0.15 per year towards the Ontario Library Service, so the announced cuts would save me $0.075 per year.

A single TTC fare is currently $3.25, which is 43 years of OLS cuts. In 43 years I will be 85, and 3 of my 4 grandparents died by that age. So if I ever, even once, have to leave my neighbourhood to fetch a book because it is not available by interlibrary loan (for example, if it can only be sourced from a library that's affected by these cuts), I will not have gotten my money's worth.

Mailing a book would cost even more than that.  And buying a book would cost even more than that. 

So basically, if I am ever, even once in my life, inconvenienced by these cuts, I will not have gotten my money's worth.

Considerations:

The Ontario fiscal year runs from April to March, so the 2017-2018 numbers are from April 2017 to March 2018. I've used these because I couldn't find the 2018-2019 public accounts. The tax return numbers I've suggested using for your own salary and taxes paid are from January 2018 to December 2018 (assuming you used your 2018 return).  If anyone can provide a source for more current numbers, or for numbers that cover the exact same time period, please post in the comments.