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A comment on The Billionaire Behind Efforts to Kill the U.S. Postal Service [pdf]. Parent comment

Re:The Billionaire Behind Efforts to Kill the U.S. Postal Se... by harimau777 on Tuesday July 21, 2020 @09:47PM (#23913131)
A problem with this strategy is that libraries are often used by the homeless in order to study and apply for jobs.

Librarians also provide expertise in sourcing knowledge that isn't available online; particularly with the way that Google search has evolved.

Larger libraries also provide archivist roles and even small libraries may serve to archive local news and history.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:The Billionaire Behind Efforts to Kill the U.S. Postal Se... by linuxftw on Wednesday July 22, 2020 @11:00AM (#23917743)
Everything is a cost/benefit analysis. Do libraries provide some services that home internet can't? Yes. Does that make them overall a better investment? No.

There's already unemployment agencies. Maybe they can setup computers to assist the homeless. Or you know, the homeless shelter could have a computer for job searching.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:The Billionaire Behind Efforts to Kill the U.S. Postal Se... by harimau777 on Thursday July 23, 2020 @07:54AM (#23926340)
Certainly it would be possible to re-create the services provided by libraries elsewhere; but at that point haven't we just re-created the library?
[ Parent | on HN ]