Basic Cost Benefit Analysis for Assessing Local Public Projects
- 1h 55m
- Barry P. Keating, Maryann O. Keating
- Business Expert Press
- 2014
Cost Benefit Analysis is an attempt to fully account for all costs associated with a new proposal along with a detailed calculation of specific private and public benefits. Properly employed, CBA is simply a method for assessing a proposal prior to a collective decision by calculating net benefits relative to an alternative project or the default option of doing nothing. CBA guidelines exist in the form of highly theoretical, mathematically complex handbooks published by international and national organizations. These reports are generally beyond the scope of local decision makers entrusted with evaluation of small municipal projects.
This book fills the gap between national and international manuals, on the one hand, and the need of local officials to perform or interpret CBA studies out-sourced to consultants, on the other. Because standard statistical packages, spreadsheets, and graphical analyses are more accessible than at any previous time, CBA, as a tool, is more accessible for informing decisions made in the public interest. There is some optimal amount for public good provision that reflects, to the degree possible, resident taxpayers' willingness to pay, but this book is four-fold:
- to discuss the economic underpinnings of cost benefit analysis,
- to address measurement problems associated with shadow pricing of public goods,
- to outline potential pitfalls for the non-specialist, and, finally, and
- to present and explain a CBA template in reference to three cases relevant to local government decision making.
In this Book
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An Introduction to Cost Benefit Analysis
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Cost Benefit Analysis and Individual Preferences
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Time Preference and the Discount Rate
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Measuring Costs and Benefits
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Shadow Pricing
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Potential Pitfalls in Cost Benefit Analysis
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Introducing Cost Benefit Analysis to the Non-Specialist
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Cost Benefit Analysis of Proposed New Regulations
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Case Study: Contracting Versus a Municipal Animal Control Shelter
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Case Study: Cost Benefit Analysis for a Forty Acre Industrial Park Intended to Spawn Economic Development and Jobs
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Case Study: Establishing a Recreational Program for the Disabled
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Notes
