How Well Do Governments Assess the Distributional Impacts of Policy?

Journal article

Policy makers are showing increased interest in understanding the impacts of public policies on subgroups of the population. We provide the first cross‐regional comparison of distributional analyses by examining 907 benefit–cost analyses (BCAs) in the United States, the United Kingdom, and the European Union from 2016 through 2020. In these regions, we find almost no quantification of net benefits for a population subgroup (2 US BCAs, 0 UK BCAs, and 1 EU BCA). Distributional weights were also rarely used (5 UK BCAs, none elsewhere). Moreover, when distributional weights were used in the United Kingdom, they were used mainly to evaluate policies involving income transfers between low‐ and high‐income groups rather than in broader regulatory analyses. We consider possible explanations for the lack of quantification of net benefits by subgroup along with the implications of our findings for conducting distributional analysis. JEL Classification: K23, K32, Q58, I0

Authors: Cecot, C; Hahn, RW; Imamoglu, E

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Wiley
• Journal: Regulation & Governance
• Article number: rego.70122
• Publication date: 2026-02-19
• Acceptance date: 2025-12-22
• DOI: 10.1111/rego.70122
• EISSN: 1748-5991
• ISSN: 1748-5983
• Language: English
• Keywords: benefit–cost analysis; regulatory impact analysis; equity; distributional analysis; regulation; comparative governance