SBCA Awards
Introducing the Society Fellows Program
The Society for Benefit-Cost Analysis announces the creation of a Society Fellows Program to recognize people who have made substantial contributions to the theory or practice for benefit-cost analysis. This program enhances the ability of SBCA to recognize outstanding achievement in the field of benefit-cost analysis. While SBCA has had an outstanding achievement award, the new Fellows program enables it to better capture the full set of people leading our field.
Past winners of SBCA’s outstanding achievement award will be the inaugural group of fellows: James K. Hammitt, Al McGartland, Maureen L. Cropper, Michael Jones-Lee, W. Kip Viscusi, David L. Weimer, Steve Aos and Arnold Harberger.
The SBCA Board of Directors expects to select approximately four Fellows in each of the next two years and then select up to two Fellows each year thereafter.
Awardees must have demonstrated a significant contribution to the theory and/or practice of benefit-cost analysis. While not essential, participation in SBCA, SBCA-sponsored events, and publication in the Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis will be considered to be important aspects of an individual’s contribution. A candidate must be living at the time of nomination. Membership in the Society is not required.
Any SBCA member may nominate a candidate for Fellow. SBCA looks to make the Fellows group as diverse as possible and welcomes nominations from around the world.
Nominations should include a vita of the nominee, a two-page nomination letter outlining what contributions the individual has made that warrant the award, and at least one additional letter of support from a second individual. In addition, members of the SBCA Board of Directors may nominate candidates that have not been otherwise nominated. Nominations are to be submitted via email to info@benefitcostanalysis.org by October 31 each year.
New Fellows will be announced during the SBCA Annual Meeting.
Outstanding Achievement Award
In 2016, the SBCA Board of Directors created the Outstanding Achievement Award to be awarded as appropriate to individuals who make significant contributions to the field of benefit-cost analysis.
Award Recipients
2021
James K. Hammitt, Professor, Harvard University
Professor Hammitt has applied rigorous quantitative methods to make numerous important contributions in several areas where benefit-cost analysis plays a key role. These include management of long-term environmental issues with important scientific uncertainties, such as global climate change and stratospheric-ozone depletion; evaluation of ancillary benefits and countervailing risks associated with risk-control measures; characterization of social preferences over health and environmental risks using revealed-preference, stated-preference, and health-utility methods; and estimation and application of the value of statistical life measures in a wide array of contexts.
Professor Hammitt is one of the most-cited authors in the Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis. He was previously a member of the SBCA Board of Directors and serves as a member of the Journal‘s Editorial Board.
2017
Steve Aos
Assistant Director, Washington State Institute for Public Policy
Richard Zerbe Distinguished Service Award
Voluntary organizations like the SBCA are created by, and thrive through, the efforts of individuals. More so than any other person, the SBCA owes its success to the efforts of Richard Zerbe. Not only did he conceive of the value that would be provided to scholars, practitioners, and society from an organization dedicated to promoting the appropriate use of BCA, he also took steps to create it. Working with the Evans School at the University of Washington and aided by the generous support of the MacArthur Foundation, he launched the SBCA with great success. The Board of Directors sought to honor his contributions by creating the Richard Zerbe Distinguished Service Award in 2014 to be awarded as appropriate to individuals who make significant contributions to helping the SBCA further its mission.
Award Recipients
2021
Henrik Andersson, Université Toulouse 1 Capitole, and Massimo Florio, Università degli Studi di Milano
Professors Andersson and Florio have been instrumental in expanding the Society‘s international standing. They took the lead in going from a vaguely defined idea generated by the SBCA Board, that the Society should increase its role in Europe, to create a thriving European community with strong annual meetings and webinars. Professor Florio pushed ahead early by having SBCA co-sponsor his summer workshop on Benefit-Cost analysis for several years. Professor Andersson built on the emerging European network and the Society‘s nascent visibility to work with several colleagues to hold the first SBCA European Annual Conference in 2019 (hosted by the Toulouse School of Economics). From those beginnings, the Society has now established a process for holding annual meetings and for holding webinars featuring top experts in the field. Professors Andersson and Florio‘s efforts provide a useful model for expanding the ways the Society can reach out to analysts in the rest of the world. In addition, both served full terms on the Society‘s Board of Directors.
2019
Fran Sussman
Former SBCA Board Member
2018
Susan Dudley
SBCA Past President
2016
Erika Dowd
SBCA Executive Director
