Lisa Robinson on Cost-Benefit Analysis
On this episode of Free Range, host Mike Livermore is joined by Lisa Robinson, a senior research scientist and the deputy director at the Center for Health at the Harvard School of Public Health. Lisa is a leading expert in the use of cost-benefit analysis to evaluate public policy.
Episode is an appropriate teaching tool for but not limited to the following topics & courses: Public Policy Analysis, Environmental Policy, Health Policy, Business Regulations, Economics, Ethics
Discussion Questions
- What are some of the main benefits and criticisms of using formal cost-benefit analysis to evaluate public policy decisions?
- How does cost-benefit analysis help clarify the consequences of policy decisions versus obscure the stakes? What are the trade-offs between complexity and transparency?
- What are some of the challenges with incorporating distributional analysis into cost-benefit analysis? How might agencies improve in this area?
- When there is a conflict between efficiency and equity in a policy decision, how should that tradeoff be made? Who should make that judgement call?
Additional Readings
- Robinson, Lisa A., James K. Hammitt, and Richard J. Zeckhauser. “Attention to distribution in U.S. regulatory analyses.” Review of Environmental Economics and Policy 10.2 (2016): 308-328.
- Robinson, Lisa A., James K. Hammitt, Joseph E. Aldy, Alan Krupnick, and Jennifer Baxter. “Valuing the risk of death from terrorist attacks.” Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management 7.1 (2010).
- Sunstein, Cass R. “Cost-benefit analysis and the knowledge problem.” Delivering sustainable growth-Priorities for the new commission (2019): 37-44.
- Adler, Matthew D., and Eric A. Posner. “Rethinking cost-benefit analysis.” The Yale Law Journal 109.2 (1999): 165-247.
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