This paper adopts a real options framework to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of four types of subsidies that aim to encourage a socially desirable land use under return uncertainties and costly reversibility of land use change. We first present a land conversion model to show how the subsidies...

This chapter provides an economic perspective of environmental law and policy. We examine the ends of environmental policy, that is, the setting of goals and targets, beginning with normative issues, notably the Kaldor–Hicks criterion and the related method of assessment known as...

Decisions concerning environmental protection hinge on estimates of economic burden. Over the past 30 years, economists have developed and applied various tools to measure this burden. In this chapter, we present a taxonomy of costs along with methods for measuring those costs. At the broadest...

Recent work has clarified the welfare implications of the application of cost-effectiveness analysis to the allocation of health care. Although cost-effectiveness analysis shares many similarities with cost-benefit analysis, it did not develop as an outgrowth of neoclassical welfare economics....

Prevention ranges from medical decisions such as vaccinations and clinical preventive services delivered during periodic health examinations to private health lifestyle decisions such as regular exercise and non-smoking. The aim of this chapter is to provide an overview of economic issues that...