The value of economic impact assessment to decision-making

Have you ever felt sceptical about a claim that a company, programme or policy creates hundreds of thousands of jobs or contributes several percent to GDP? You’re not alone.

As economic impact assessment specialists, we spend a lot of time rigorously calculating past or future economic impact, and addressing inevitable questions that arise from economic claims. Below we’ll break down (i) why we use economic impact assessment, (ii) why economic impact assessment may rightly elicit a healthy dose of scepticism, and (iii) how we can address that scepticism by making economic impact assessments as transparent and effective as possible.