20
Table 6 contains data on several items which previously had been collected only in the ARL
Supplementary Statistics. These data are especially useful because they reflect monies spent on all
electronic serials, while the ARL Statistics categories of “serials purchased” and “serials expenditures”
include only those journals which provide full‐text electronic versions to their subscribers. The
Expenditures for Electronic Serials time series may be viewed as an alternative to the Serials
Purchased series, both figures reflecting in their own way the influence the electronic serial is gaining
in the modern research library.
Not only have electronic materials expenditures grown sharply in the past decade, they have
grown at a rate far exceeding that of library materials expenditures overall. As shown in Graph 6, in
every year of the last decade electronic materials expenditures have grown sharply, anywhere
between two and ten times faster than materials expenditures have.
The average ARL university library now spends just under 41% of its materials budget on
electronic materials (Tables 7A and 7B), and 23 ARL libraries report that they spent more than 50% of
their materials budget on electronic materials (see Rank Order Table 20).
Table 6
Electronic Materials Expenditures
In ARL University Libraries, 2005-06
Sum Number Reporting
Expenditures for Computer Files
(one-time/monographic purchase)
$48,793,981 102
Expenditures for Electronic Serials $383,472,634 108
Expenditures for Bibliographic Utilities,
Networks, etc. (Library)
$26,016,318 102
Expenditures for Bibliographic Utilities,
Networks, etc. (External)
$15,946,247 83
Expenditures for Hardware and Software $68,808,319 104
Expenditures for Document
Delivery/Interlibrary Loan
$13,425,430 107
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