Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to explain the necessity of secure budget in public libraries with regard to promoting library usage. It is namely to attempt to find out if there really is a connection between library funding and library usage. For this purpose, the relevant data of all the 31 public libraries in Busan were collected from the 2013 National library Statistics of Korea. To determine the connection between library funding and usage, two variables were selected, 'TFI (Total Funding Indicator) = <TEX>$\sqrt{personnelcosts{\times}materialcosts}$</TEX>' for independent variable and 'LU (Library Usage) = (visits per year) + (loans per year)/number of inhabitants' for dependent variable. The results showed that there is a clear relationship between TFI and LU and If more cost is spent on personal resources and material resources, the total usage of the public library also increase. The findings are limited due to the fact that the observation was focusing on public libraries in one community and the period of observation was one year in 2013.