The Discount Rate for Public Policy Over the Distant Future

The Discount Rate for Public Policy Over the Distant Future PDF Author: Qingran Li
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

Get Book Here

Book Description
The choice of discount rate has a significant impact on net benefit estimates when costs today have benefits over long time horizons. Standard U.S. government practice for cost-benefit analysis is to bound such analysis using two alternative rates. These rates are meant to represent the rate of return paid by capital investment and the rate received by consumers. Previous work has shown this approach legitimately bounds the analysis--but only when future benefits accrue directly to consumers either in a two-period model or as a perpetuity. We generalize to consider arbitrary patterns of future benefits, accruing either directly to consumers or indirectly through future investment. We derive an expression for the appropriate discount rate and show that it converges to the consumption rate for benefits increasingly far into the future. More generally, the bounding rates depend on the temporal pattern of the undiscounted dollars. As an application, we estimate the appropriate discount rate for climate change damages from carbon dioxide, finding it lies in a narrow range (+/- 0.5 percent) around the consumer rate of interest.

The Discount Rate for Public Policy Over the Distant Future

The Discount Rate for Public Policy Over the Distant Future PDF Author: Qingran Li
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

Get Book Here

Book Description
The choice of discount rate has a significant impact on net benefit estimates when costs today have benefits over long time horizons. Standard U.S. government practice for cost-benefit analysis is to bound such analysis using two alternative rates. These rates are meant to represent the rate of return paid by capital investment and the rate received by consumers. Previous work has shown this approach legitimately bounds the analysis--but only when future benefits accrue directly to consumers either in a two-period model or as a perpetuity. We generalize to consider arbitrary patterns of future benefits, accruing either directly to consumers or indirectly through future investment. We derive an expression for the appropriate discount rate and show that it converges to the consumption rate for benefits increasingly far into the future. More generally, the bounding rates depend on the temporal pattern of the undiscounted dollars. As an application, we estimate the appropriate discount rate for climate change damages from carbon dioxide, finding it lies in a narrow range (+/- 0.5 percent) around the consumer rate of interest.

Pricing the Planet's Future

Pricing the Planet's Future PDF Author: Christian Gollier
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691148767
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 244

Get Book Here

Book Description
Today, the judge, the citizen, the politician, and the entrepreneur are concerned with the sustainability of our development.

Valuing Climate Damages

Valuing Climate Damages PDF Author: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309454204
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 281

Get Book Here

Book Description
The social cost of carbon (SC-CO2) is an economic metric intended to provide a comprehensive estimate of the net damages - that is, the monetized value of the net impacts, both negative and positive - from the global climate change that results from a small (1-metric ton) increase in carbon-dioxide (CO2) emissions. Under Executive Orders regarding regulatory impact analysis and as required by a court ruling, the U.S. government has since 2008 used estimates of the SC-CO2 in federal rulemakings to value the costs and benefits associated with changes in CO2 emissions. In 2010, the Interagency Working Group on the Social Cost of Greenhouse Gases (IWG) developed a methodology for estimating the SC-CO2 across a range of assumptions about future socioeconomic and physical earth systems. Valuing Climate Changes examines potential approaches, along with their relative merits and challenges, for a comprehensive update to the current methodology. This publication also recommends near- and longer-term research priorities to ensure that the SC- CO2 estimates reflect the best available science.

Discounting and Intergenerational Equity

Discounting and Intergenerational Equity PDF Author: Paul R. Portney
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135892016
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 262

Get Book Here

Book Description
The full effects of decisions made today about many environmental policies -including climate change and nuclear waste- will not be felt for many years. For issues with long-term ramifications, analysts often employ discount rates to compare present and future costs and benefits. This is reasonable, and discounting has become a procedure that raises few objections. But are the methods appropriate for measuring costs and benefits for decisions that will have impacts 20 to 30 years from now the right ones to employ for a future that lies 200 to 300 years in the future? This landmark book argues that methods reasonable for measuring gains and losses for a generation into the future may not be appropriate when applied to a longer span of time. Paul Portney and John Weyant have assembled some of the world's foremost economists to reconsider the purpose, ethical implications, and application of discounting in light of recent research and current policy concerns. These experts note reasons why conventional calculations involved in discounting are undermined when considering costs and benefits in the distant future, including uncertainty about the values and preferences of future generations, and uncertainties about available technologies. Rather than simply disassemble current methodologies, the contributors examine innovations that will make discounting a more compelling tool for policy choices that influence the distant future. They discuss the combination of a high shout-term with a low long-term diescount rate, explore discounting according to more than one set of anticipated preferences for the future, and outline alternatives involving simultaneous consideration of valuation, discounting and political acceptability.

The Social Discount Rate

The Social Discount Rate PDF Author: Humberto Lopez
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

Get Book Here

Book Description
The social discount rate measures the rate at which a society would be willing to trade present for future consumption. As such it is one of the most critical inputs needed for cost-benefit analysis. This paper presents estimates of the social discount rates for nine Latin American countries. It is argued that if the recent track record in terms of growth in the region is indicative of future performance, estimates of the social discount rate would be in the 3-4 percent range. However, to the extent that the region improves on its past performance, the social discount rate to be used in the evaluation of projects would increase to the 5-7 percent range. The paper also argues that if the social planner gives a similar chance to the low and high growth scenario, the discount rate should be dependent on the horizon of the project, declining from 4.4 percent for a 25-year horizon to less than 4 percent for a 100-year horizon.

Discounting for Public Cost-Benefit Analysis

Discounting for Public Cost-Benefit Analysis PDF Author: Qingran Li
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Get Book Here

Book Description
Standard U.S. practice for public cost-benefit analysis is to bound the discount rate with the interest rate paid by capital investment and rate received by consumers. These bounding cases arise when future benefits accrue to consumers in either a two-period model or as a perpetuity. We generalize to consider benefits paid in any future period. We find that the appropriate discount rate converges to the consumption rate for benefits in the distant future. More generally, the range of rates depends on the temporal pattern. Applied to CO2 damages, we estimate the appropriate discount rates of between 2.6 and 3.4 percent.

Project Evaluation

Project Evaluation PDF Author: Arnold C. Harberger
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226315932
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 342

Get Book Here

Book Description
The collection of papers on social project evaluation.

Stubborn Attachments

Stubborn Attachments PDF Author: Tyler Cowen
Publisher: Stripe Press
ISBN: 1953953352
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 180

Get Book Here

Book Description
From a bestselling author and economist, a contemporary moral case for economic growth—and a dose of inspiration and optimism about our future possibilities. Growth is good. Through history, economic growth, in particular, has alleviated human misery, improved human happiness and opportunity, and lengthened human lives. Wealthier societies are more stable, offer better living standards, produce better medicines, and ensure greater autonomy, greater fulfillment, and more sources of fun. If we want to continue on our trends of growth, and the overwhelmingly positive outcomes for societies that come with it, every individual must become more concerned with the welfare of those around us. So, how do we proceed? Tyler Cowen, in a culmination of 20 years of thinking and research, provides a roadmap for moving forward. In this new book, Stubborn Attachments: A Vision for a Society of Free, Prosperous, and Responsible Individuals, Cowen argues that our reason and common sense can help free us of the faulty ideas that hold us back as people and as a society. Stubborn Attachments, at its heart, makes the contemporary moral case for economic growth and delivers a great dose of inspiration and optimism about our future possibilities. As a means of practicing the altruism that Stubborn Attachments argues for, Tyler Cowen is donating all earnings from this book to a man he met in Ethiopia earlier this year with aspirations to open his own travel business.

Valuing the Future

Valuing the Future PDF Author: G. M. Heal
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 9780231113076
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 244

Get Book Here

Book Description
Heal presents a coherent framework for understanding the Earth's future from an economic perspective and offers a dynamic new blueprint for comprehending sustainability.

Discounting for Time and Risk in Energy Policy

Discounting for Time and Risk in Energy Policy PDF Author: Robert C. Lind
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135985251
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 476

Get Book Here

Book Description
This is a collection of theoretical papers, including contributions by Partha Dasgupta and three Nobel prize-winning economists: Kenneth Arrow, Amartya Sen, and Joseph Stiglitz. Originally published in 1982.