David H Greenberg
Datos Biográficos
| ID | 1084348 |
|---|---|
| NOMBRE | David H Greenberg |
| NOMBRES | David H |
| APELLIDO | Greenberg |
| FIRMA | GREENBERG D H |
| AFILIACIONES | University of Maryland, Baltimore County |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6004-3171 |
| VERIFICADO | Sí |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 41 |
| TOTAL DE CITAS | 137 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 41 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMER AÑO DE PUBLICACIÓN | 1968 |
| AÑO MÁS RECIENTE DE PUBLICACIÓN | 2025 |
| ÍNDICE H | 7 |
Practical issues in conducting distributional weighting in benefit‐cost analysis
A commonly expressed concern about distributional weighting in benefit‐cost analysis is that the informational burden is too high and the practical challenges insurmountable. In this paper, we address this concern by conducting distributional weighting on a number of real‐world examples, covering a range of different types of policy impacts. We uncover and explore a number of methodological issues that arise in the process of distributional weigh…
Distributional weighting and welfare/equity tradeoffs
There are increasing calls for concrete suggestions on how to account for distributional impacts in policy analysis. Within the context of benefit-cost analysis, per se, one possibility is to apply “distributional weights,” to inflate costs and benefits experienced by poor or disadvantaged groups. We distinguish between “utility-weights,” intended to correct for the bias in willingness to pay caused by diminishing marginal utility of income, and …
The Elasticity of Marginal Utility of Income for Distributional Weighting and Social Discounting
Estimates of the elasticity of the marginal utility of income are necessary for determining distributional weights to correct for diminishing marginal utility of income, which is particularly important in light of increasing concern about accounting for distributional impacts in regulatory review. The elasticity is also necessary for computing the social discount rate using the Ramsey formula. Despite many attempts to estimate the elasticity of t…
Standing in Cost‐Benefit Analysis
Whose costs and benefits should count in cost‐benefit analysis (CBA)? This is an important practical question requiring answers for analysts because most government agencies offer only permissive or vague guidance. Drawing primarily on foundational CBA principles, we present a conceptual framework for specifying standing to answer three important boundary questions: Where? Who? What? First, a standing framework requires a definition of jurisdicti…
Efficiency without Apology
Some issues in the application of benefit–cost analysis (BCA) remain contentious. Although a strong conceptual case can be made for taking account of the marginal excess tax burden (METB) in conducting BCAs, it is usually excluded. Although a strong conceptual case can be made that BCA should not include distributional values, some analysts continue to advocate doing so. We discuss the cases for inclusion of the METB and the exclusion of distribu…
Conducting Evaluations Using Multiple Trials
This paper reviews the use of multiple trials, defined as multiple sites or multiple arms in a single evaluation and replications, in evaluating social programs. After defining key terms, the paper discusses the rationales for conducting multiple trials, which include increasing sample size to increase statistical power; identifying the most effective program design; increasing external validity; and learning how various factors affect program im…
Cost-Benefit Analysis
Cost–Benefit Analysis
Cost-Benefit Analysis provides accessible, comprehensive, authoritative, and practical treatments of the protocols for assessing the relative efficiency of public policies. Its review of essential concepts from microeconomics, and its sophisticated treatment of important topics with minimal use of mathematics helps students from a variety of backgrounds build solid conceptual foundations. It provides thorough treatments of time discounting, deali…
A cost-benefit analysis of Tulsa’s IDA program
This article presents findings from a cost-benefit analysis of the Tulsa Individual Development Account (IDA) program, a demonstration program that was initiated in the late 1990s and is being evaluated through random assignment. The program put particular emphasis on using savings subsidies to help participants accumulate housing assets. The key follow-up data used in the evaluation was collected around 10 years after random assignment, about 6 …
Have Welfare-to-Work Programs Improved over Time in Putting Welfare Recipients to Work
The authors examine data from 21 random assignment evaluations of 76 experimental welfare-to-work programs conducted in the United States between 1983 and 1998 to determine whether the impacts of these programs on employment improved over time. Welfare-to-work programs have long played an important role in the federal assistance program known as Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), now called Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TAN…
A Synthesis of Random Assignment Benefit-Cost Studies of Welfare-to-Work Programs
Over the past two decades, federal and state policymakers have dramatically reshaped the nation’s system of cash welfare assistance for low-income families. During this period, there has been considerable variation from state to state in approaches to welfare reform, which are often collectively referred to as “welfare-to-work programs.” This article synthesizes an extraordinary body of evidence: results from 28 benefit-cost studies of welfare-to…
Mass Media and Modern Warfare
The crowding out hypothesis
Designing a social experiment for the UK
English The UK's Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) Demonstration is currently evaluating a new strategy for job retention and advancement for disadvantaged workers. This article focuses on the ERA design phase and lessons from that effort. The design phase had a number of unusual features: the location of the core project team performing the design work at the Cabinet Office, rather than at the department initiating the project or the de…
Do experimental and nonexperimental evaluations give different answers about the effectiveness of government-funded training programs
This paper uses meta-analysis to investigate whether random assignment (or experimental) evaluations of voluntary government-funded training programs for the disadvantaged have produced different conclusions than nonexperimental evaluations. Information includes several hundred estimates from 31 evaluations of 15 programs that operated between 1964 and 1998. The results suggest that experimental and nonexperimental evaluations yield similar concl…
Conducting Meta‐Analyses of Evaluations of Government‐Funded Training Programs
Government‐funded training programs in the United States have often been subject to rigorous evaluation. Indeed, many of these programs have been evaluated with random assignment, although sophisticated quasi‐experimental methods have also been used. Until very recently, however, there has been little systematic attempt to use the cumulative information vested in these evaluations to attempt determine which kinds of programs work best in which se…
Large-Scale Social Experimentation in Britain
The Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) Demonstration programme is a major current welfare-to-work social experiment, the largest random allocation evaluation ever mounted in Great Britain. This article draws on experience gained in designing the ERA Demonstration to explore the strengths and limitations of social experimentation for policy evaluation and analysis. The focus of the discussion is on the reasons for the choice of random allo…
The Labor Market Consequences of Childhood Maladjustment
Objective. This article uses data from the National Child Development Survey on a cohort of individuals born in Great Britain during the first week of March 1958 to investigate whether educational attainment and labor force behavior 33 years later are affected by childhood behavioral problems that are exhibited at both age 7 and age 16. Method. Regression methods are used to test hypotheses concerning these effects. Results. Our results indicate …
When Welfare-to-Work Programs Seem to Work Well
Of welfare-to-work programs evaluated by random assignment, two stand out as having exceptionally large estimated effects: one in Riverside, California, and the other in Portland, Oregon. The authors use data from 24 evaluations and the tools of meta-analysis to examine why. The findings indicate that the apparently superior performance of these two programs in increasing the earnings of participants is only partly attributable to program design …
Meta-Evaluation
Numerous programmes designed to encourage welfare recipients to move into work and off benefit have been evaluated in the United States. Many have randomly assigned potential participants into ‘experimental’ and ‘control’ groups to generate unbiased estimates of the effectiveness of the programmes. The results of the evaluations have been selectively influential in shaping policy developments on both sides of the Atlantic, but a thorough understa…
Just give me a number!” Practical values for the social discount rate
A major reason the quality of cost‐benefit analysis (CBA) varies widely is inconsistent use of the social discount rate (SDR). This article offers guidance about the choice of the SDR. Namely, we recommend the following procedures: If the project is intragenerational (does not have effects beyond 50 years) and there is no crowding out of private investment, then discount all flows at 3.5 percent; if the project is intragenerational and there is s…
A Meta-Analysis of Government-Sponsored Training Programs
This study uses meta-analysis to synthesize findings from 31 evaluations of 15 voluntary government-funded training programs for the disadvantaged that operated between 1964 and 1998. On average, the earnings effects of the evaluated programs seem to have been largest for women, quite modest for men, and negligible for youths. For men and women, the earnings effects of training appear to have persisted for at least several years after the trainin…
Parental disruption and the labour market performance of children when they reach adulthood
The dissemination and utilization of welfare-to-work experiments in state policymaking
This paper reports the results of a telephone survey of state-level officials as to the influence of evaluations of three state welfare innovations: California's GAIN, New York's CAP, and Florida's Project Independence. The three experiments were known to those interviewed, yet they did not have dramatic, decisive effects on policymaking. However, GAIN and CAP appear to have influenced policymaking in less dramatic and more subtle respects. Much …
Welfare-to-Work
Introduction: Welfare, work and welfare-to-work in the UK, Andreas Cebulla and Robert Walker The road to Britain's new deal, Andreas Cebulla The use of evidence in designating the 'new deal', Andreas Cebulla Workfare evaluations and meta-analysis, David Greenberg and Karl Ashworth A description of US Welfare-to-work programmes, Karl Ashworth and David Greenberg Determining what works and for how long, Robert Walker and David Greenberg Looking ove…
Just give me a number!” Practical values for the social discount rate
A major reason the quality of cost‐benefit analysis (CBA) varies widely is inconsistent use of the social discount rate (SDR). This article offers guidance about the choice of the SDR. Namely, we recommend the following procedures: If the project is intragenerational (does not have effects beyond 50 years) and there is no crowding out of private investment, then discount all flows at 3.5 percent; if the project is intragenerational and there is s…
A Meta-Analysis of Government-Sponsored Training Programs
This study uses meta-analysis to synthesize findings from 31 evaluations of 15 voluntary government-funded training programs for the disadvantaged that operated between 1964 and 1998. On average, the earnings effects of the evaluated programs seem to have been largest for women, quite modest for men, and negligible for youths. For men and women, the earnings effects of training appear to have persisted for at least several years after the trainin…
Parental disruption and the labour market performance of children when they reach adulthood
The Changing Role of Social Experiments in Policy Analysis
Do experimental and nonexperimental evaluations give different answers about the effectiveness of government-funded training programs
This paper uses meta-analysis to investigate whether random assignment (or experimental) evaluations of voluntary government-funded training programs for the disadvantaged have produced different conclusions than nonexperimental evaluations. Information includes several hundred estimates from 31 evaluations of 15 programs that operated between 1964 and 1998. The results suggest that experimental and nonexperimental evaluations yield similar concl…
Meta-Evaluation
Numerous programmes designed to encourage welfare recipients to move into work and off benefit have been evaluated in the United States. Many have randomly assigned potential participants into ‘experimental’ and ‘control’ groups to generate unbiased estimates of the effectiveness of the programmes. The results of the evaluations have been selectively influential in shaping policy developments on both sides of the Atlantic, but a thorough understa…
Research Utilization in Policymaking
David H. Greenberg, Marvin B. Mandell, Research Utilization in Policymaking: A Tale of Two Series (Of Social Experiments), Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, Vol. 10, No. 4 (Autumn, 1991), pp. 633-656
The changing role of social experiments in policy analysis
Since 1968 more than thirty‐five social policy experiments have been conducted in the United States. During this period through 1976 these experiments were generally long‐term, large‐scale tests of major new programs; thereafter, experiments became markedly more modest in scope. Although hundreds of millions of dollars were spent on the earlier programs, the experiments probably had only a negligible impact on policies. This result stemmed from a…
Standing in Cost‐Benefit Analysis
Whose costs and benefits should count in cost‐benefit analysis (CBA)? This is an important practical question requiring answers for analysts because most government agencies offer only permissive or vague guidance. Drawing primarily on foundational CBA principles, we present a conceptual framework for specifying standing to answer three important boundary questions: Where? Who? What? First, a standing framework requires a definition of jurisdicti…
Deviations from Wage-Fringe Standards
Examines the circumstances and forms of adjustment to the particular needs of the individual plant or company within a bargaining unit and the plant or company subject to a strong well-defined wage pattern. Deviations within a bargaining unit; Example of formal contractual agreements to widen differentials within a bargaining unit; Adjustments made in the master contract. (Abstract copyright EBSCO.)
Distributional weighting and welfare/equity tradeoffs
There are increasing calls for concrete suggestions on how to account for distributional impacts in policy analysis. Within the context of benefit-cost analysis, per se, one possibility is to apply “distributional weights,” to inflate costs and benefits experienced by poor or disadvantaged groups. We distinguish between “utility-weights,” intended to correct for the bias in willingness to pay caused by diminishing marginal utility of income, and …
The Elasticity of Marginal Utility of Income for Distributional Weighting and Social Discounting
Estimates of the elasticity of the marginal utility of income are necessary for determining distributional weights to correct for diminishing marginal utility of income, which is particularly important in light of increasing concern about accounting for distributional impacts in regulatory review. The elasticity is also necessary for computing the social discount rate using the Ramsey formula. Despite many attempts to estimate the elasticity of t…
Large-Scale Social Experimentation in Britain
The Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) Demonstration programme is a major current welfare-to-work social experiment, the largest random allocation evaluation ever mounted in Great Britain. This article draws on experience gained in designing the ERA Demonstration to explore the strengths and limitations of social experimentation for policy evaluation and analysis. The focus of the discussion is on the reasons for the choice of random allo…
The Social Experiment Market
In social experiments, individuals, households, or organizations are randomly assigned to two or more policy interventions. Elsewhere, we have summarized 143 experiments completed by autumn 1996. Here, we use the information we have gathered on these experiments and findings from informal telephone interviews to investigate the social experiment market--the buyers and sellers in the market that governs the production of experiments. We discuss ta…
The economic consequences of experiencing parental marital disruptions
When Welfare-to-Work Programs Seem to Work Well
Of welfare-to-work programs evaluated by random assignment, two stand out as having exceptionally large estimated effects: one in Riverside, California, and the other in Portland, Oregon. The authors use data from 24 evaluations and the tools of meta-analysis to examine why. The findings indicate that the apparently superior performance of these two programs in increasing the earnings of participants is only partly attributable to program design …
Practical issues in conducting distributional weighting in benefit‐cost analysis
A commonly expressed concern about distributional weighting in benefit‐cost analysis is that the informational burden is too high and the practical challenges insurmountable. In this paper, we address this concern by conducting distributional weighting on a number of real‐world examples, covering a range of different types of policy impacts. We uncover and explore a number of methodological issues that arise in the process of distributional weigh…
Efficiency without Apology
Some issues in the application of benefit–cost analysis (BCA) remain contentious. Although a strong conceptual case can be made for taking account of the marginal excess tax burden (METB) in conducting BCAs, it is usually excluded. Although a strong conceptual case can be made that BCA should not include distributional values, some analysts continue to advocate doing so. We discuss the cases for inclusion of the METB and the exclusion of distribu…
Conducting Evaluations Using Multiple Trials
This paper reviews the use of multiple trials, defined as multiple sites or multiple arms in a single evaluation and replications, in evaluating social programs. After defining key terms, the paper discusses the rationales for conducting multiple trials, which include increasing sample size to increase statistical power; identifying the most effective program design; increasing external validity; and learning how various factors affect program im…
Have Welfare-to-Work Programs Improved over Time in Putting Welfare Recipients to Work
The authors examine data from 21 random assignment evaluations of 76 experimental welfare-to-work programs conducted in the United States between 1983 and 1998 to determine whether the impacts of these programs on employment improved over time. Welfare-to-work programs have long played an important role in the federal assistance program known as Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), now called Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TAN…
A Synthesis of Random Assignment Benefit-Cost Studies of Welfare-to-Work Programs
Over the past two decades, federal and state policymakers have dramatically reshaped the nation’s system of cash welfare assistance for low-income families. During this period, there has been considerable variation from state to state in approaches to welfare reform, which are often collectively referred to as “welfare-to-work programs.” This article synthesizes an extraordinary body of evidence: results from 28 benefit-cost studies of welfare-to…
The crowding out hypothesis
Designing a social experiment for the UK
English The UK's Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) Demonstration is currently evaluating a new strategy for job retention and advancement for disadvantaged workers. This article focuses on the ERA design phase and lessons from that effort. The design phase had a number of unusual features: the location of the core project team performing the design work at the Cabinet Office, rather than at the department initiating the project or the de…
Multisite Employment and Training Program Evaluations
This paper explores the gains from multiplying the number of sites used in experimental evaluation of the effects of employment and training programs. Using a multilevel (hierarchical) statistical framework, the authors analyze the role of site multiplication in three recent program evaluations. Although several experiments have involved substantial numbers of sites, the potential benefits from such strategies are largely unrealized. The authors …
Deviations from Wage-Fringe Standards
Examines the circumstances and forms of adjustment to the particular needs of the individual plant or company within a bargaining unit and the plant or company subject to a strong well-defined wage pattern. Deviations within a bargaining unit; Example of formal contractual agreements to widen differentials within a bargaining unit; Adjustments made in the master contract. (Abstract copyright EBSCO.)
Employing the Training-Program Enrollee
Examination of the method for evaluating the success of training programs. Use of the personnel records of employers to follow up on the progress of trainees; Methodology; Results and discussion. (Abstract copyright EBSCO.)
Evaluating the Impact of Manpower Programs
The Sensitivity of Male Labor Supply Estimates to Choice of Assumptions
The task is an analysis of the traditional labor supply model using several competing methodologies. The approach is a step-by-step exploration of alternative labor supply estimating equations that attempts to identify the independent (marginal) effect of each particular change in the form of these equations. By systematically exploring what difference each of these changes makes to the parameter estimates, one can isolate which factors strongly …
An Economic Methodology for Measuring the Benefits of Children
Underreporting and Experimental Effects on Work Effort
David Greenberg, Robert Moffitt, John Friedmann, Underreporting and Experimental Effects on Work Effort: Evidence from the Gary Income Maintenance Experiment, The Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 63, No. 4 (Nov., 1981), pp. 581-589
Inappropriate Comparisons as a Basis for Policy
This paper examines the problem of inappropriate comparisons in evaluating social programs and the erroneous policy conclusions which can be derived from such comparisons. The paper examines two cases from the United States of America which fail to meet the criterion that comparison groups (if necessary after statistical adjustment) should be identical in all essential respects except in their exposure to the program. In the first of the two case…
A Simulation Analysis of the Economic Efficiency and Distributional Effects of Alternative Program Structures
The economic consequences of experiencing parental marital disruptions
Measuring the Impact of Nit Experiments on Work Effort
In spite of exhaustive research by many analysts on the data generated by the NIT experiments, uncertainty remains over whether work reductions in the experiments should be considered "large" or "small." The authors of this paper argue that this uncertainty arises in part because different analysts have implicitly measured the responses of different groups of individuals exposed to the NIT treatment. The authors use data from the Seattle-Denver e…
The Changing Role of Social Experiments in Policy Analysis
The changing role of social experiments in policy analysis
Since 1968 more than thirty‐five social policy experiments have been conducted in the United States. During this period through 1976 these experiments were generally long‐term, large‐scale tests of major new programs; thereafter, experiments became markedly more modest in scope. Although hundreds of millions of dollars were spent on the earlier programs, the experiments probably had only a negligible impact on policies. This result stemmed from a…
Research Utilization in Policymaking
David H. Greenberg, Marvin B. Mandell, Research Utilization in Policymaking: A Tale of Two Series (Of Social Experiments), Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, Vol. 10, No. 4 (Autumn, 1991), pp. 633-656
Multisite Employment and Training Program Evaluations
This paper explores the gains from multiplying the number of sites used in experimental evaluation of the effects of employment and training programs. Using a multilevel (hierarchical) statistical framework, the authors analyze the role of site multiplication in three recent program evaluations. Although several experiments have involved substantial numbers of sites, the potential benefits from such strategies are largely unrealized. The authors …
The Work Alternative
Recommends a redefined social contract that takes into account realities of the job market and the transitory sense of the assistance
The Social Experiment Market
In social experiments, individuals, households, or organizations are randomly assigned to two or more policy interventions. Elsewhere, we have summarized 143 experiments completed by autumn 1996. Here, we use the information we have gathered on these experiments and findings from informal telephone interviews to investigate the social experiment market--the buyers and sellers in the market that governs the production of experiments. We discuss ta…
The dissemination and utilization of welfare-to-work experiments in state policymaking
This paper reports the results of a telephone survey of state-level officials as to the influence of evaluations of three state welfare innovations: California's GAIN, New York's CAP, and Florida's Project Independence. The three experiments were known to those interviewed, yet they did not have dramatic, decisive effects on policymaking. However, GAIN and CAP appear to have influenced policymaking in less dramatic and more subtle respects. Much …
Parental disruption and the labour market performance of children when they reach adulthood
A Meta-Analysis of Government-Sponsored Training Programs
This study uses meta-analysis to synthesize findings from 31 evaluations of 15 voluntary government-funded training programs for the disadvantaged that operated between 1964 and 1998. On average, the earnings effects of the evaluated programs seem to have been largest for women, quite modest for men, and negligible for youths. For men and women, the earnings effects of training appear to have persisted for at least several years after the trainin…
Meta-Evaluation
Numerous programmes designed to encourage welfare recipients to move into work and off benefit have been evaluated in the United States. Many have randomly assigned potential participants into ‘experimental’ and ‘control’ groups to generate unbiased estimates of the effectiveness of the programmes. The results of the evaluations have been selectively influential in shaping policy developments on both sides of the Atlantic, but a thorough understa…
Just give me a number!” Practical values for the social discount rate
A major reason the quality of cost‐benefit analysis (CBA) varies widely is inconsistent use of the social discount rate (SDR). This article offers guidance about the choice of the SDR. Namely, we recommend the following procedures: If the project is intragenerational (does not have effects beyond 50 years) and there is no crowding out of private investment, then discount all flows at 3.5 percent; if the project is intragenerational and there is s…
Conducting Meta‐Analyses of Evaluations of Government‐Funded Training Programs
Government‐funded training programs in the United States have often been subject to rigorous evaluation. Indeed, many of these programs have been evaluated with random assignment, although sophisticated quasi‐experimental methods have also been used. Until very recently, however, there has been little systematic attempt to use the cumulative information vested in these evaluations to attempt determine which kinds of programs work best in which se…
Large-Scale Social Experimentation in Britain
The Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) Demonstration programme is a major current welfare-to-work social experiment, the largest random allocation evaluation ever mounted in Great Britain. This article draws on experience gained in designing the ERA Demonstration to explore the strengths and limitations of social experimentation for policy evaluation and analysis. The focus of the discussion is on the reasons for the choice of random allo…
The Labor Market Consequences of Childhood Maladjustment
Objective. This article uses data from the National Child Development Survey on a cohort of individuals born in Great Britain during the first week of March 1958 to investigate whether educational attainment and labor force behavior 33 years later are affected by childhood behavioral problems that are exhibited at both age 7 and age 16. Method. Regression methods are used to test hypotheses concerning these effects. Results. Our results indicate …
When Welfare-to-Work Programs Seem to Work Well
Of welfare-to-work programs evaluated by random assignment, two stand out as having exceptionally large estimated effects: one in Riverside, California, and the other in Portland, Oregon. The authors use data from 24 evaluations and the tools of meta-analysis to examine why. The findings indicate that the apparently superior performance of these two programs in increasing the earnings of participants is only partly attributable to program design …
Economics (33 obras) · Engineering (19 obras) · Gender, Labor, and Family Dynamics (19 obras) · Political science (19 obras) · Business (13 obras) · Computer Science (13 obras) · Psychology (13 obras) · Public economics (13 obras) · Mathematics (10 obras) · Welfare (9 obras)