Can Government Play Moneyball?

In a recent article in The Atlantic, Advisory Council member Peter Orszag and co-author John Bridgeland argue for more evidence-driven budgetary decisions. They highlight findings from a paper released by The Hamilton Project and Results For America, “Building on Recent Advances in Evidence-Based Policymaking,” in which Jeffrey Liebman of Harvard University discusses several government strategies have begun to emerge—at the federal, state, and local levels—that offer the potential of simultaneously making better use of taxpayer dollars and speeding up progress in addressing serious social problems and outlines five steps that policymakers can take to better inform their work with evidence. He also proposes a grant competition that identifies and encourages innovation in ten social policy priority areas as well as federal support for state and local Pay for Success initiatives. Orszag and Bridgeland highlight Liebman’s finding that “spending a few hundred million dollars more a year on evaluations could save tens of billions of dollars by teaching us which programs work and generating lessons to improve programs that don’t.” To read the full piece, click here.