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Session Title: Understanding Alternative Economic-based Approaches to Valuation
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Panel Session 707 to be held in Pacific C on Friday, Nov 4, 2:50 PM to 4:20 PM
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Sponsored by the Quantitative Methods: Theory and Design TIG
and the Costs, Effectiveness, Benefits, and Economics TIG
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| Chair(s): |
| George Julnes, University of Baltimore, gjulnes@ubalt.edu
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| Discussant(s):
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| Michael Scriven, Claremont Graduate University, mjscriv1@gmail.com
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| Abstract:
Economic-based approaches to judging the value of public policies and programs are becoming the standard by which other approaches to valuation are assessed. These quantitative approaches offer many insights but are also controversial. This session will offer three views of this approach to valuation, along with a discussant.
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Valuing Program Outcomes Relative to Program Costs to Improve Both:
Alternative Forms of Cost-Inclusive Evaluation
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| Brian Yates, American University, brian.yates@mac.com
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"Value" can be understood as referring not only to what the outcomes of a good or service are likely to be, but also to how those outcomes compare to what we anticipate sacrificing to achieve those outcomes. This form of evaluation compares the worth of outcomes to the worth of resources expended to produce those outcomes. Alternative means of assessing the worth of both outcomes achieved and resources consumed are described in the first part of this presentation, using a few specific evaluations of human services. The second portion of this presentation uses an additional example to illustrate an evaluation framework that includes the activities in which program participants engage, and the changes that occur in participants, as well as resources used and outcomes produced. This more comprehensive valuing process also empowers better decision-making by incorporating information from clients and community members as well as from providers and funders.
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Lessons from Valuing in Resource, Environmental and Conservation Settings
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| Andy Rowe, GHK International, andy.rowe@earthlink.net
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Resource, environmental and conservation (REC) settings feature a two-system evaluand where both the human and natural systems must be explicitly included in evaluation. This provides a useful perspective to consider some of the implicit underlying premises of valuing as part of summative evaluations. This paper reviews some of these including:
- Whose values get counted? Cultures often have very different uses for resources and these differences in utility can lead to radical differences in how cultures value resources. Value is fundamentally a human construct; does evaluation need to consider values important primarily to the natural system such as connectivity and resilience, position in a food chain, etc.?
- What can we learn from emerging approaches in conservation such as ecosystem services and natural capital that is useful for valuing in evaluation?
- How do we incorporate temporal and spatial boundaries relevant to the natural system when evaluation values largely from within the human system and is timed to address the temporal and spatial needs of the human system?
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Reconciling Conflicting Views of Benefit-Cost Analysis in Service of the Public Interest
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| George Julnes, University of Baltimore, gjulnes@ubalt.edu
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Benefit-cost analysis began as a tool for serving a utilitarian view of the public interest. As confidence in the Kaldor-Hicks logic has faded in economics, other foundations of benefit-cost analyses have been developed. This presentation will help orient evaluators to the challenges and controversies in this area.
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