Guidelines for Preparing Economic Analyses
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What are the Guidelines?
Why are the Guidelines important?
What topics are covered in the Guidelines?
Who are the Guidelines for?
How were the Guidelines produced?
How will future updates to the Guidelines be incorporated?
Download a copy of the Guidelines.
For further information on the Guidelines.
What are the Guidelines?
EPA's
Guidelines for Preparing Economic Analyses establish a sound scientific framework for performing economic analyses of environmental regulations and policies. They incorporate recent advances in theoretical and applied work in the field of environmental economics. The
Guidelines provide guidance on analyzing the benefits, costs, and economic impacts of regulations and policies, including assessing the distribution of costs and benefits among various segments of the population.
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Why are the Guidelines important?
The
Guidelines serve several important functions: (1) they assist policy makers in developing regulations that achieve the highest environmental quality and human health standards at the lowest costs; (2) provide analysts with information needed to prepare high quality economic analyses; (3) develop an overarching framework for economic analyses throughout the Agency and across EPA Program Offices; and (4) ensure that important subjects such as uncertainty, timing, and valuation of costs and benefits, are treated consistently in all economic analyses at EPA. EPA will use the
Guidelines to evaluate the economic consequences of its regulations and policies to insure that they contribute to a safe environment and a healthy economy.
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What topics are covered in the Guidelines?
The Guidelines address major analytical issues on key topics, including:
- Estimating the value of reduced health risks and improved environment quality
- Defining baseline conditions (i.e., contrasting the state of the economy and environment with and without a proposed regulatory policy).
- Discounting and comparing differences in the timing of benefits, costs, and impacts
- Assessing and describing who pays the costs and receives the benefits of regulations
- Locating available data sources for conducting economic analyses.
- Presenting the results of economic analysis, including non-monetary information
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Who are the Guidelines for?
The main audiences for the
Guidelines are those performing or using economic analysis, including policy makers, the Agency's Program and Regional Offices, and contractors providing economic reports to the EPA. However, the
Guidelines may also be useful for those teaching courses on benefit cost analysis or environmental economics.
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How were the Guidelines Produced?
Development of the Guidelines was led by the EPA's National Center for Environmental Economics (NCEE) in consultation with economists from across the Agency. The Guidelines were subject to peer review by the Environmental Economics Advisory Committee of EPA's Science Advisory Board. The committee, comprising leading environmental economists from major universities and research institutions, assessed the Guidelines for accuracy in both economic theory and practice. In their final report to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, the Science Advisory Board offered specific recommendations for improvement, but noted that "...the Guidelines significantly elevate the quality and transparency of the information upon which environmental decisions are made." The final Guidelines were revised in response to the comments of the Science Advisory Board.
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How will future updates to the Guidelines be incorporated?
EPA intends to revise and update these Guidelines periodically to capture new literature and the best available science. As new chapters are developed or existing chapters revised, they will be made available for download on this website once they pass external peer review. Each chapter will contain a date stamp indicating its "publication" date.
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Download a copy of the Guidelines.
The Guidelines are available for download in a single PDF file (PDF, 2,340 K, About PDF). Individual chapters are also available:
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For further information on the Guidelines.
Nathalie Simon (Guidelines Project Leader and Associate Director, NCEE): 202-566-2347, Simon.nathalie@epa.gov
Al McGartland (NCEE, Director): 202-566-2244
Office fax number: 202-566-2363
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