The Society for Benefit-Cost Analysis

The second annual meeting of the Society for Benefit-Cost Analysis was held October 20–21, 2009 in Washington, D.C. Participants came from academia, private industry, nonprofit organizations, and government offices. Presenters for 11 panels shared cutting-edge scholarship in the areas of education, public health, applications of benefit-cost analysis, the environment, transportation, energy, and benefit-cost analysis theory and methods. The Society’s annual meeting of the membership featured impromptu remarks by Society for Benefit-Cost Analysis President Dr. Arnold Harberger, in addition to the generation of ideas for broadening benefit-cost analysis’ appeal and application.

Conference Agenda

Tuesday, October 20

• Panel 1: Social Policy I
  Chair: Lynn Karoly, RAND Corporation
  • The Rate of Return to the High/Scope Perry Preschool Program by James J. Heckman, Seong Hyeok Moon, Rodrigo Pinto, Peter Savelyev, and Adam Yavitz
  • Deriving Benefit-Costs Analyses from Social Experiments: Challenges and Opportunities by Stephen H. Bell
  • A Synthesis of Benefit-Cost Studies of Welfare-to-Work Programs (1.75 MB PDF) by Victoria Deitch and David Greenberg
• Panel 2: Public Health
  Chair: James K. Hammitt, Harvard University
  • Foodborne Disease Surveillance Cost Benefit Analysis by Robert L. Scharff
  • A Hedonic Estimation of Benefits from Anti-Smoking Laws by Ramanan Laxminarayan, Shawn Magnuson, and Juha Siikamaki
• Panel 3: Applications
  Chair: Clive Belfield, Queens College
  • The Challenges of Homeland Security Cost-Benefit Analysis: An Illustrative Example by Katie Foreman and Bryan Roberts
  • Cost-Benefit Analysis of Real Estate Development Projects by Kenneth Acks

Wednesday, October 21

• Panel 4: Water Planning
  Chair: Scott Farrow, University of Maryland - Baltimore County
  • Treatment of General Equilibrium Effects in the Economic Appraisal of Large, Multipurpose Dams by Dale Whittington
  • Benefit Cost Analysis and Water Resources Planning Guidelines: Policy and Practice (4.6 MB PDF) by Larry Prather and Norm Starler
  • Power Purchase Agreements for Risk and Rent Sharing in Himalayan Hydropower Developments by Glenn P. Jenkins
• Panel 5: CBA and Governance
  Chair: Daniel Cole, Indiana University
  • A Practical Guide for the Intensity of Effort in Regulatory Benefit-Cost Analysis by Richard A Williams, Jr. and Richard B. Belzer
  • CBA for the Environment - A Handbook for Economists at the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency by Scott Cole and Katarina Östberg
  • The Use of Benefit-Cost Analysis in Four States by Stuart Shapiro and Debra Borie-Holtz
• Panel 6: Social Policy II
  Chair: Glenn P. Jenkins, Queens University and Eastern Mediterranean University
  • Cost-Effectiveness in Early Childhood Development Programs: A Synthesis and Critique of Evidence in the First Decade of Life by Arthur Reynolds, Judy Temple, and Barry White
  • Estimating the Social Value of Higher Education: Willingness to Pay for Community and Technical Colleges by Glenn C. Blomquist, Paul A. Coomes, Christopher Jepsen, Brandon C. Koford, and Kenneth R. Troske
  • Benefits and Costs of Slot Machine Gambling: A Forecast for Maryland by Scott Farrow
• Panel 7: Climate Change
  Chair: Richard B. Belzer, Regulatory Checkbook
  • The "Social Cost of Carbon" Made Simple by Stephen Newbold, Charles Griffiths, Chris Moore, and Ann Wolverton
  • Decision Making and Climate Change - What Role for Economics? (a.k.a. "What Would Ben Franklin Say?") (889 KB PDF) by Fran Sussman
  • Conflicting Goals: Energy Security vs. GHG Reductions under the EISA Cellulosic Ethanol Mandate by Art Fraas and Rob Johansson
• Panel 8: Theory and Methods I
  Chair: Nandita Dasgupta, University of Maryland - Baltimore County
  • Implications of a Weaker form of Complementarity by Jon Neill
  • The Discount Rate for Public Projects by Richard O. Zerbe, Jr.
  • The Role of Pareto and Compensation Principles in Benefit-Cost Analysis by Andrew Schmitz
• Meeting of the Society
  Meeting minutes (168KB PDF)
• Panel 9: Theory and Methods II
  Chair: David Ballard, GRA, Inc.
  • Is Willingness to Pay a Measure of Well-Being? (130 KB PDF) by Mark Sagoff
  • Using Subjective Well-Being Measures to Value Policy Outcomes by Kevin Marsh
• Panel 10: Energy
  Chair: Joseph Cordes, The George Washington University
  • Do Market Failures Justify Energy Efficiency Standards? by Wallace Oates, Ian Parry, and David Evans
  • Optimal Subsidies for Wind Power: An Application to the Cape Wind Project (4MB PDF) by Jonathan Haughton and David Tuerck
  • Benefit-Cost Comparison of Alternative Propulsion Systems for Urban Delivery Vehicles by John D. Graham and Kerry Krutilla
• Panel 11: Transportation
  Chair: Chair Adam Sicking, Economics Team Leader, Regulatory Development and Economic Analysis
  • Dulles Silver Line Metro: Cost Benefit Analysis Revisited by Nandita Dasgupta
  • Quantifying the Public- and Private-Sector Benefit of PPP Toll Road Projects by Lei Zhang
  • Benefit Cost Analysis of a Multiple Agency, Multiple Stakeholder Federal Investment Program: The NextGen Transformation of Air Traffic Control by David Ballard