There is growing skepticism among both academics and government officials about the benefits of large-scale sport and cultural events. Although Input-Output (IO) has long been the dominant approach to estimating the impacts of these events, the method faces criticism for both its lack of realism and the incompleteness of its results. Consequently, economists have begun to turn to two alternative approaches: computable general equilibrium (CGE) and cost-benefit analysis. These approaches can take into account effects not captured within an IO framework. They also often produce strikingly different results than those obtained using an IO model. This post reports some preliminary results from ongoing research evaluating nearly 60 studies that use cost-benefit methods to evaluate events. More complete results will be presented at the Society for Benefit-Cost Analysis Conference in March 2019.

An IO approach is fundamentally a multiplier approach, converting expenditures (on infrastructure, for example) into gross production in the host city. One limitation is that IO treats expenditures, such as those for infrastructure or by the local population, as fully additional; since this approach does not take account of substitution (i.e., that these resources have been diverted from other uses), it may overstate the favorable economic impact of an event. Another concern is IO’s focus only on gross domestic product and other related impacts, rather than on welfare, which also recognizes externalities and opportunity costs (Massiani 2018).

The earliest examples of the use of cost-benefit analysis and CGE to evaluate mega-events appeared in the 1980s and 1990s, respectively. Since then, almost 60 cost-benefit analyses of mega events of different sizes have been conducted. (For an examination of the use of CGE in evaluating mega-events, see Massiani (2018a).)

Fomenting revolution brings to mind crowds storming the barricades, not analysts struggling to debug a spreadsheet or craft a clear sentence. Yet in his book, The Cost-Benefit Revolution, Cass Sunstein (Robert Walmsley University Professor, Harvard Law School) argues that benefit-cost analysts are doing exactly that. The barricades we surmount are decision-making errors resulting from overreliance on intuition and emotion, our weapons are science and economics, and our achievements are better policies.

Since 2010, I have been a practitioner of practical benefit-cost analysis at Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC), working with colleagues to inform policymakers and stakeholders about the likely impacts of proposed federal environmental regulations. I would like to examine a key issue in developing estimates of the benefits and costs of these regulations: the development of the baseline in a benefit-cost analysis.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) plays an important role in the federal legislative process. CBO’s score on a given bill—that is, its estimate of how it would affect the federal budget deficit—can determine whether Congress decides to go forward with the bill, modify it to get a more favorable estimate, or simply drop it. Given their importance, debates over CBO’s scores and the methods they use to produce them can be as controversial as the bills that are being considered. While this controversy can be politically motivated (with advocates on either side of an issue arguing for a score that is more favorable to their position), it also stems from limited understanding of CBO’s intended role in the process—and reflects the difficulty of conducting analyses of benefits and costs in the context of policy decisions.

If you had billions of dollars to make the world a better place, and could spend it however you wanted, how would you maximize your impact? This is not just a thought experiment, but a daily concern for the world’s governments, philanthropists, and multilateral institutions. Since 2004, Copenhagen Consensus has been using cost-benefit analysis to help decision makers identify highly effective interventions. While most cost-benefit analysis seeks the best solution for a single problem, Copenhagen Consensus takes a wider view, looking across all major domains for policies that improve social welfare.

Gothenburg, Sweden hosted the 2018 World Congress for Environmental and Resource Economists, which met from June 25-29, 2018. The five-day conference was held at the School of Business, Economics, and Law, which is part of the University of Gothenburg. The conference was made possible by the joint effort of three major economics associations: the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists (AERE), the East Asian AERE (EAAERE), and the European AERE (EAERE).

Under the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was required to establish standards limiting air toxics emissions from industrial plants. An article in the latest issue of the Journal of Benefit Cost Analysis  (JBCA), “Retrospective Analyses Are Hard: A Cautionary Tale from EPA's Air Toxics Regulations,” takes a retrospective look at 5 of the largest rules issued by EPA in the initial round of air toxics rulemaking over the period 1995 to 2000. For the rules examined, our estimates suggest mixed results, in terms of the reductions in emissions that were achieved. However, our efforts during the project also reinforce the difficulty of obtaining adequate plant emissions data, even where there is an established database--in this case, the Toxic Release Inventory (TRI).

One of the reasons I look forward each year to the annual conference of the Society for Benefit Cost Analysis is connecting with fellow economists who have chosen careers in my specialty, which has evolved to be regulatory policy and analysis. I enjoy sharing and hearing everyone’s war stories and appreciate the advice I receive from those who have “been there, done that” and hope that I add value when I offer the same to new economists working to influence the policy process.

In April, I had the opportunity to engage with other regulatory economists in a very different setting, when I represented the Department of Transportation (DOT) as part of a U.S. delegation to Bogota, Colombia. The purpose of the trip was to inform Colombia’s efforts to implement good regulatory practices by sharing U.S. regulatory experience. In preparing for the trip, I learned that the adoption of good regulatory practices is part of the accession requirements of the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which Colombia is seeking to join. Also, Colombia recently implemented a mandatory requirement to conduct Regulatory Impact Analysis (RIA) for new regulations and its regulatory agencies are in the early phases of complying with that requirement.

It was my honor to preside over the 2018 Society for Benefit-Cost Analysis (SBCA) Conference held March 14 – 16 at the George Washington University in Washington, DC. I am happy to report that by all indications it was another successful conference. We had 319 total registrants from 19 countries across 5 continents. U.S. participants represented 31 states and D.C. Half of all participants were affiliated with the U.S. federal government. The next largest group were academics (almost one-third); other attendees were from the private sector or from state and international government agencies. The three pre-conference professional development workshops were well attended and also drew a mix of participants from federal, state, and international agencies, as well as academics.

The conference evaluations we’ve received so far rank the overall quality of the 2018 SBCA conference at 4.4 on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being the highest. We are combing through the details and responses to the open-ended questions to see how we can do even better next year. We welcome more feedback, even when open-ended comments point out problems we can’t do much about, like the unseasonably cold weather in D.C. this past March!