Abstract Net Revenue of a public library is not an indicator of the true value of services rendered by a public library to the wider society. The peoples’ perception of the service of the library or economic value is the true value of the library. The Contingent Valuation Method (CVM) used to assess the economic value of a public library which is not a service in the free market economy. This study employs CVM: a branch of the Stated Preference Method to measure the economic value of the Colombo Public Library (CPL) Sri Lanka. The payment vehicle is a Trust Fund. The logistic regression has been applied to estimate the Willingness to Pay (WTP) of citizens which elicited through single bound dichotomous choice question with onetime payment option. The WTP for the population is aggregated by using mean probabilistic logic WTP of the sample. The study found that annualized economic value of the CPL is higher than its total capital and recurrent expenditure per year. Thus, continuation of public funding is acceptable even CPL makes financial losses to the Colombo Municipal Council.

中文翻译：

---

斯里兰卡科伦坡公共图书馆的经济价值：或有估值法

摘要公共图书馆的净收入并不表示公共图书馆对更广泛的社会提供服务的真实价值。人民对图书馆服务或经济价值的看法是图书馆的真正价值。或有评估法（CVM）用于评估在自由市场经济中不是服务的公共图书馆的经济价值。这项研究采用CVM：陈述偏好方法的一个分支，用以衡量斯里兰卡科伦坡公共图书馆（CPL）的经济价值。付款工具是信托基金。逻辑回归已被用于估计公民的支付意愿（WTP），该意愿是通过单次二分式选择问题和一次性支付选择引起的。通过使用样本的平均概率逻辑WTP来汇总总体的WTP。研究发现，CPL的年度经济价值高于其每年的总资本和经常性支出。因此，即使CPL给科伦坡市议会造成财政损失，继续提供公共资金也是可以接受的。