Policy Impact Assessment Quotes

You have to have a sense of what it looks like, not from the point of view of the policymaker but from the point of view of those who are at the receiving end of your policies.

Every plausible policy must be followed by the question 'And then what?'

I come back to what I had said earlier: the policies might be there but are people benefiting from the policies? You do find that in many instances, though the policies exist, they are not having the necessary impact. That is a particular challenge in local government, because that is where all the services get delivered.

You never know exactly how new policies are going to work. That doesn't mean you shouldn't try them.

Economic policies need to be analyzed in terms of the incentives they create, rather than the hopes that inspired them.

Improving the quality of our lives should be the ultimate target of public policies. But public policies can only deliver best fruit if they are based on reliable tools to measure the improvement they seek to produce in our lives.

I do a lot of work with policymakers, but how much effect am I having? It’s like they’re coming in and saying to you, ‘I’m going to drive my car off a cliff. Should I or should I not wear a seatbelt?’ And you say, ‘I don’t think you should drive your car off the cliff.’ And they say, ‘No, no, that bit’s already been decided—the question is whether to wear a seatbelt.’ And you say, ‘Well, you might as well wear a seatbelt.’ And then they say, ‘We’ve consulted with policy expert Rory Stewart and he says . . . .’

The best public policy is made when you are listening to people who are going to be impacted.

There are a lot of policies that don't work out that are nevertheless worth doing.

Let's say I'm on the policy wonk end of the spectrum. As much as I can dive into a briefing book and really work to master various subjects that come before my desk, I'm still not an expert on a huge amount of the stuff that we work on.

One has to always ask the question: Where can one be most effective in helping shape policies? It is always difficult when you're inside because you're very constrained.

More that members of Senate know about Medicaid, in many ways, the harder it is to make that final decision, because you have got so much information, and you know how many other things are impacted here by one decision here that, five decisions later, has made a big difference in somebody's life.