IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/epplan/v64y2017icp105-109.html

SROI in the pay for success context: Are they at odds?

Author

Listed:
  • Fischer, Robert L.
  • Richter, Francisca García-Cobián

Abstract

The Pay For Success (PFS) and Social Impact Bond (SIB) movements to date have focused heavily on shorter-term outcomes that can be monetized and show clear savings to government entities. In part, this focus derives from the need to specify contract payments based on a narrow set of well measured outcomes (e.g., avoided days in jail and foster care, decreased use of behavioral health services). Meanwhile efforts to measure the social return on investment (SROI) of interventions have sought to expand the view of relevant outcomes to include domains that lend themselves less clearly to monetization. This paper explores the intersection between these two movements with illustrations from a SIB initiative underway focused on homeless families with children in foster care. Challenges and potential for SROI in a third-party payor environment will be discussed as well as opportunities to better leverage the strengths of both types of initiative.

Suggested Citation

  • Fischer, Robert L. & Richter, Francisca García-Cobián, 2017. "SROI in the pay for success context: Are they at odds?," Evaluation and Program Planning, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 105-109.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:epplan:v:64:y:2017:i:c:p:105-109
    DOI: 10.1016/j.evalprogplan.2016.11.012
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S014971891630235X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.evalprogplan.2016.11.012?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Charles F. Manski, 2013. "Response to the Review of ‘Public Policy in an Uncertain World’," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 0, pages 412-415, August.
    2. Manski, Charles F., 2013. "Public Policy in an Uncertain World: Analysis and Decisions," Economics Books, Harvard University Press, number 9780674066892, Spring.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Eleonora Broccardo & Maria Mazzuca & Maria Laura Frigotto, 2020. "Social impact bonds: The evolution of research and a review of the academic literature," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 27(3), pages 1316-1332, May.
    2. Mariano Méndez-Suárez & Abel Monfort & Fernando Gallardo, 2020. "Sustainable Banking: New Forms of Investing under the Umbrella of the 2030 Agenda," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-13, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bo, Hao & Galiani, Sebastian, 2021. "Assessing external validity," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(3), pages 274-285.
    2. Koppelaar, Rembrandt H.E.M. & Keirstead, James & Shah, Nilay & Woods, Jeremy, 2016. "A review of policy analysis purpose and capabilities of electricity system models," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 1531-1544.
    3. Alberto Abadie & Susan Athey & Guido W. Imbens & Jeffrey M. Wooldridge, 2020. "Sampling‐Based versus Design‐Based Uncertainty in Regression Analysis," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 88(1), pages 265-296, January.
    4. Charles F. Manski & John V. Pepper, 2018. "How Do Right-to-Carry Laws Affect Crime Rates? Coping with Ambiguity Using Bounded-Variation Assumptions," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 100(2), pages 232-244, May.
    5. Muller, Seán M., 2021. "The dangers of performative scientism as the alternative to anti-scientific policymaking: A critical, preliminary assessment of South Africa’s Covid-19 response and its consequences," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    6. Millimet, Daniel L. & Roy, Jayjit, 2015. "Multilateral environmental agreements and the WTO," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 134(C), pages 20-23.
    7. Huhr, Scott & Wulczyn, Fred, 2022. "Do intensive in-home services prevent placement?: A case study of Youth Villages’ Intercept® program," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 132(C).
    8. Richard ILes, 2017. "Government Doctor Absenteeism And Its Effects On Consumer Demand In Rural North India," Working Papers 2018-9, School of Economic Sciences, Washington State University.
    9. Manganelli, Simone, 2025. "Statistical decision functions with judgment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 223(C).
    10. Susan Athey & Raj Chetty & Guido Imbens, 2020. "Using Experiments to Correct for Selection in Observational Studies," Papers 2006.09676, arXiv.org, revised May 2025.
    11. Richard A. Iles, 2019. "Government doctor absenteeism and its effects on consumer demand in rural north India," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(4), pages 475-491, April.
    12. Charles F. Manski, 2020. "Towards Reasonable Patient Care Under Uncertainty," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 38(2), pages 227-245, April.
    13. Benno Torgler, 2022. "The power of public choice in law and economics," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(5), pages 1410-1453, December.
    14. Charles F. Manski, 2018. "Reasonable patient care under uncertainty," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(10), pages 1397-1421, October.
    15. Reiner Eichenberger & Rainer Hegselmann & David Savage & David Stadelmann & Benno Torgler, 2020. "Certified Corona-Immunity as a Resource and Strategy to Cope with Pandemic Costs," CREMA Working Paper Series 2020-03, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    16. Riccardo Scarpa & Claudia Bazzani & Diego Begalli & Roberta Capitello, 2021. "Resolvable and Near‐epistemic Uncertainty in Stated Preference for Olive Oil: An Empirical Exploration," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 72(2), pages 335-369, June.
    17. Ho Fai Chan & Nikita Ferguson & David A. Savage & David Stadelmann & Benno Torgler, 2020. "Is Science Able to Perform Under Pressure? Insights from COVID-19," CREMA Working Paper Series 2020-07, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    18. Raffaella Giacomini & Toru Kitagawa, 2021. "Robust Bayesian Inference for Set‐Identified Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 89(4), pages 1519-1556, July.
    19. Jeff Dominitz & Charles F. Manski, 2025. "A Decision Theoretic Perspective on Artificial Superintelligence: Coping with Missing Data Problems in Prediction and Treatment Choice," Papers 2509.12388, arXiv.org.
    20. Eric Danan & Thibault Gajdos & Brian Hill & Jean-Marc Tallon, 2016. "Robust Social Decisions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(9), pages 2407-2425, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:epplan:v:64:y:2017:i:c:p:105-109. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/evalprogplan .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.