Social discount rate
Glossary: Resilience, published by the Department for International Development in 2016, defines the social discount rate as: ‘…the discount rate used to calculate the present value of costs and benefits in a social cost-benefit analysis. In conception, the social discount rate should reflect the social opportunity cost of capital, i.e. the rate of return to capital in its best alternative use. The higher the social discount rate used, the lower is the weight effectively given to future benefits or costs compared to present benefits or costs.’
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