Evaluations
Evaluations assess the impact and efficiency of regulations from an economic perspective ex-post (ex-ante: cf. regulatory impact assessment). We evaluate both government and privately initiated measures, regulations, programs and projects.
Our methodological expertise focuses in particular on the following aspects:
- Impact models: The basis of a sound evaluation is the design of an impact model. An impact model represents a chain of "if-then" relationships and allows a conceptual understanding of the impact relationship of a specific measure or regulation.
- Counterfactual scenario: As a basis for evaluating the impact of a measure, there must be as much clarity as possible about the "what-if", i.e. the assessment of how a situation would develop in the absence of a measure. For this purpose, the definition of a counterfactual scenario is a key step of an evaluation.
- Endogeneity: A simple analysis of the effectiveness of a measure often leads to distorted results, since a measure may influence relevant political and economic outcome variables, but the introduction of a measure in turn depends on political and economic factors. To account for and isolate such interdependencies, we often apply special statistical methods such as the "difference-in-differences approach" (Diff-in-Diff).
We are a member of the Swiss Evaluation Society SEVAL and follow the SEVAL standards.
