Social discount rate: a revision

Abstract

This paper is focused in the problem of choosing a social discount rate (SDR) for public investment projects. The standard use of the cost-benefit analysis based on the exponential discounting and a constant discount rate has been criticized, when used to appraise long-term public projects. The critiques are motivated for the scarce importance this model attaches to the consequences of a certain project in the distant future and so to future generations. For this Feason, several authors have approached the discounting process in a different way, taking into account variable discount rates and new discounting functions. In this paper, we have tried to include al1 the relevant contributions on the searching of an appropriate social discount rate, offering an overview of the research in the area.