Cost-Benefit Analysis Concepts and Practice

Sometimes the benefits and costs of program interventions can be estimated through experimental and quasi-experimental designs.1 This chapter first describes experimental and quasi-experimental designs, indicating how they are used in estimating the impacts of social programs in policy areas such as health, education, training, employment, housing, and welfare. It then describes how these impacts are incorporated into CBAs of employment and training programs, illustrating how concepts developed in earlier chapters can be used in actual cost–benefit analyses. The case study that follows the chapter examines CBAs of a number of employment and training programs that were targeted at welfare recipients.