[closewith]

> It also recouped more than the trial's net cost of 72 million euros ($86 million) through increases in arts-related expenditure, productivity gains and reduced reliance on other social welfare payments, according to a government-commissioned cost-benefit analysis.

I'd love to see the breakdown on this, because in my experience with Government comms, if it was a straightforward economic win like an FDI or industrial announcement, they'd headline the figure. Unquantified phrases like "reduced reliance on other social welfare payments" are usually spin at best.

[lbreakjai]

This sentence sounds like "We saved 1000€ on benefits thanks to this 1500€ totally not a benefit payment!"

[jmmcd]

I understand your point, but in response to GP (they should spend this money on houses for other poor people instead), the reduced reliance on other social welfare is totally legitimate to count.

[closewith]

I agree, but another commenter linked the cost-benefit analysis and it really is creative accounting to get to a positive net social return.

The net fiscal cost after accounting for increase tax revenue and social protection savings was €72 MM.

This was then offset to get to a positive net social gain by €80 MM in "wellbeing gains", as measured by a single survey question called the WELLBY test:

> “Overall, how satisfied are you with your life nowadays, where 0 is "not at all satisfied" and 10 is "completely satisfied"?

The €80 MM in "wellbeing gains", which is the sole decider of whether this pilot was a net positive or a huge net negative to society, is because on average, the 2,000 pilot scheme participants had a very approximate 0.7–1.1 increase in score when asked the above question during the pilot as compared to before the pilot. Each 1 point was deemed to be worth €15,340.

[nandomrumber]

Wild!

They just totally made up[1] a number, tripled it, doubled that, and finally applied a multiplier before using it as the basis to support their preconceived… let’s not mince words: agenda.

1. That’s not very kind. I’m sure they didn’t “just make it up”. There’s bound to be an entire bureaucracy if not dedicated to, at least tasked with, conjuring up this sort of codswallop.