The Cost-Benefit Revolution

The Cost-Benefit Revolution
Author: Cass R. Sunstein
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 286
Release: 2019-09-24
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0262538016

Why policies should be based on careful consideration of their costs and benefits rather than on intuition, popular opinion, interest groups, and anecdotes. Opinions on government policies vary widely. Some people feel passionately about the child obesity epidemic and support government regulation of sugary drinks. Others argue that people should be able to eat and drink whatever they like. Some people are alarmed about climate change and favor aggressive government intervention. Others don't feel the need for any sort of climate regulation. In The Cost-Benefit Revolution, Cass Sunstein argues our major disagreements really involve facts, not values. It follows that government policy should not be based on public opinion, intuitions, or pressure from interest groups, but on numbers—meaning careful consideration of costs and benefits. Will a policy save one life, or one thousand lives? Will it impose costs on consumers, and if so, will the costs be high or negligible? Will it hurt workers and small businesses, and, if so, precisely how much? As the Obama administration's “regulatory czar,” Sunstein knows his subject in both theory and practice. Drawing on behavioral economics and his well-known emphasis on “nudging,” he celebrates the cost-benefit revolution in policy making, tracing its defining moments in the Reagan, Clinton, and Obama administrations (and pondering its uncertain future in the Trump administration). He acknowledges that public officials often lack information about costs and benefits, and outlines state-of-the-art techniques for acquiring that information. Policies should make people's lives better. Quantitative cost-benefit analysis, Sunstein argues, is the best available method for making this happen—even if, in the future, new measures of human well-being, also explored in this book, may be better still.

New Foundations of Cost-Benefit Analysis

New Foundations of Cost-Benefit Analysis
Author: Matthew D. Adler
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2006-10
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780674022799

In this book, the authors reconceptualize cost-benefit analysis, arguing that its objective should be overall well-being rather than economic efficiency. This book not only places cost-benefit analysis on a firmer theoretical foundation, but also has many practical implications for how government agencies should undertake cost-benefit studies.

Cost-Benefit Analysis

Cost-Benefit Analysis
Author: Anthony E. Boardman
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 605
Release: 2018-07-19
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1108415997

A comprehensive and authoritative introduction to cost-benefit analysis that aims to be readable and user-friendly.

Economic Evaluation in Education

Economic Evaluation in Education
Author: Henry M. Levin
Publisher: SAGE Publications
Total Pages: 377
Release: 2017-06-15
Genre: Education
ISBN: 148338179X

The past decade has seen increased attention to cost-effectiveness and benefit-cost analysis in education as administrators are being asked to accomplish more with the same or even fewer resources, philanthropists are keen to calculate their "return on investment" in social programs, and the general public is increasingly scrutinizing how resources are allocated to schools and colleges. Economic Evaluation in Education: Cost-Effectiveness and Benefit-Cost Analysis (titled Cost-Effectiveness Analysis: Methods and Applications in its previous editions) is the only full-length book to provide readers with the step-by-step methods they need to plan and implement a benefit-cost analysis in education. Authors Henry M. Levin, Patrick J. McEwan, Clive Belfield, Alyshia Brooks Bowden, and Robert Shand examine a range of issues, including how to identify, measure, and distribute costs; how to measure effectiveness, utility, and benefits; and how to incorporate cost evaluations into the decision-making process. The updates to the Third Edition reflect the considerable methodological development in the evaluation literature, and the greater empiricism practiced by education researchers, to help readers learn to apply more advanced methods to their own analyses.

The Costs and Benefits of Animal Experiments

The Costs and Benefits of Animal Experiments
Author: Andrew Knight
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 261
Release: 2011-05-27
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0230306411

A comprehensive review of recent scientific evidence examining the contributions of animal experimentation to human healthcare. The book also explores toxicity prediction, animal use during life and health sciences education, impacts on student attitudes toward animals, and the extent to which animals suffer in laboratories.

The Effective Measurement and Management of ICT Costs and Benefits

The Effective Measurement and Management of ICT Costs and Benefits
Author: Dan Remenyi
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 405
Release: 2007-03-27
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0080488757

This is a new and extensively updated edition of one of leading and authoritive books on the subject of IT costs and benefits. Since it was first published in the early 1990s, this book has established itself as the most comprehensive and complete approach to understanding the economics of how information is used to boost the efficiency or effectiveness of companies. The ideas in this book are used extensively in business, and the book is widely adopted and recommended at leading business schools around the world.This book will show you:How to use cost benefits analysis or business case accountingHow to use user satisfaction surveys and value for money studiesHow to integrate IT benefit delivery into IT project managementThis book covers a wide spectrum of IT cost and benefit solutions, ranging from business case accounting and user satisfaction studies right through to the business processes which need to be in place in order to ensure the effective measurement and management of IT costs and benefits. This book takes you through a basic understanding of the issues involved and onto the detail of how to perform the techniques required to measure and thus mange IT costs and benefits.The rapidly increasing level of expenditure on information technology in most organisations is one reason why IT benefits management has become an important business concern. Top management have begun to insist that much more attention be paid to the economic aspects of information systems. put the difficulties with IT benefits behind youmeasure IT benefits and manage their deliveryknow what measurement tools are available for the taskNew to the third edition: The evolution of thinking in ICT costs and benefits; management instinct; the chapter on Identification and Treatment of ICT costs is replaced with a more thorough treatment of the subject; the chapter on Risk Analysis is expanded by 50% with new and latest thinking on the subject; new chapters on: ICT evaluation as a political act, and the evaluation of an outsourcing contract. Extensive revisions of the material through out bring the book up-to-date with the latest thinking and evaluation techniques complete with a number of suggested websites through out the book where more information about the subject may be found.Covers all the practical aspects of business case accounting, ranking techniques and user information system surveys in connection with the effective measurement and management of IT costs and benefitsIdentifies a basic framework to help you understand the economic and financial issues of information technology investmentGives you evaluation concepts as well as several approaches to cost and benefit measurement Provides you with an IT Assessment Metric (ITAM) - which allows you to measure your firms progress towards obtaining maximum value from information technology procured* Gives you a basic framework to help you understand the economic and financial issues of IT investment* Covers all practical aspects of business case accounting, ranking techniques, user information system surveys IT costs and benefits analysis* Provides you with an IT Assessment Metric - allows you to measure your firms progress towards obtaining maximum value from information technology procured

The Costs and Benefits of Price Stability

The Costs and Benefits of Price Stability
Author: Martin Feldstein
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 374
Release: 2007-12-01
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0226241769

In recent years, the Federal Reserve and central banks worldwide have enjoyed remarkable success in their battle against inflation. The challenge now confronting the Fed and its counterparts is how to proceed in this newly benign economic environment: Should monetary policy seek to maintain a rate of low-level inflation or eliminate inflation altogether in an effort to attain full price stability? In a seminal article published in 1997, Martin Feldstein developed a framework for calculating the gains in economic welfare that might result from a move from a low level of inflation to full price stability. The present volume extends that analysis, focusing on the likely costs and benefits of achieving price stability not only in the United States, but in Germany, Spain, and the United Kingdom as well. The results show that even small changes in already low inflation rates can have a substantial impact on the economic performance of different countries, and that variations in national tax rules can affect the level of gain from disinflation.

Solutions for the World's Biggest Problems

Solutions for the World's Biggest Problems
Author: Bjørn Lomborg
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 19
Release: 2007-10-18
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1139469231

The world has many pressing problems. Thanks to the efforts of governments, NGOs, and individual activists there is no shortage of ideas for resolving them. However, even if all governments were willing to spend more money on solving the problems, we cannot do it all at once. We have to prioritize; and in order to do this we need a better sense of the costs and benefits of each 'solution'. This book offers a rigorous overview of twenty-three of the world's biggest problems relating to the environment, governance, economics, and health and population. Leading economists provide a short survey of the analysis and sketch out policy solutions for which they provide cost-benefit ratios. A unique feature is the provision of freely downloadable software which allows readers to make their own cost-benefit calculations for spending money to make the world a better place.

The Full Costs and Benefits of Transportation

The Full Costs and Benefits of Transportation
Author: David L. Greene
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 408
Release: 2012-12-06
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 3642590640

Modern transportation systems have far-reaching, and serious consequences: deaths and injuries from accidents, pollution of air, water and groundwater, noise congestion, and the greenhouse effect. As world transport systems expand and become increasingly motorised, the transportation community is searching for systems that are both efficient and sustainable. Here, leading international researchers explore the issues and concepts and define the state of knowledge concerning the full costs and benefits of transportation.

Gambling in America

Gambling in America
Author: Earl L. Grinols
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 248
Release: 2004-01-12
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1139450239

Gambling in America carefully breaks ground by developing analytical tools to assess the benefits and costs of the economic and social changes introduced by casino gambling in monetary terms, linking them to individual households' utility and well-being. Since casinos are associated with unintended and often negative economic consequences, these factors are incorporated into the discussion. The book also shows how amenity benefits - for casinos, the benefit to consumers of closer proximity - enter the evaluation. Other topics include agent incentives and public decision making, conceptual clarifications about economic development, cost-benefit analysis, and net export multiplier models. Professor Grinols finds that, in considering all relevant factors, the social costs of casino gambling outweigh their social benefits.