Measuring Social Impact

A strategic proposal to develop a common, research-based standard and metric (the social money multiplier) for measuring social impact in impact investing to reliably compare funds, deliver financial returns while improving lives, and expand economic opportunity.
Other Information
Relationship to Other Plans ~ Standardized metrics for social impact measurement and the calculation of social return (the social money multiplier) directly support broader strategic frameworks such as:
* Universal Strategic Standard Data Framework -- https://stratml.us/docs/USSDF.xml -- by establishing comparable, machine-readable performance metrics, and
* Rights and Responsibilities -- https://stratml.us/docs/RandR.xml -- principles to ensure accountability, transparent valuation assumptions, and shared responsibility among intergovernmental and market stakeholders.
Submitter's Note: This StratML rendition has been compiled from the source by Gemini. I have reviewed and lightly edited it in the form at https://stratml.us/forms/Claude/Part1.html

🏢Equal Opportunity Ventures

EOV

An investment firm founded in 2019 by Bill Helman and Roland Fryer to invest in businesses that expand economic opportunity.

Stakeholders:
👤Roland Fryer: Author of WSJ article entitled How Do Investors Measure ‘Social Impact’? | Professor of economics at Harvard, founder of Equal Opportunity Ventures, and senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute
🏢Global Impact Investing Network: Global network estimating impact investing scale and asset management.
The Global Impact Investing Network estimated in 2024 that nearly 4,000 organizations managed $1.57 trillion in impact investments worldwide.
🏢TPG’s Rise Fund: Investment organization that developed a similar research-based measure called the 'impact multiple of money'.
🏢Bridgespan Group: Organization that co-developed the 'impact multiple of money' metric.
🏢Department of Health and Human Services (HHS): Federal agency whose benchmark values statistical life at about $13.5 million.
👥Investors: Individuals and organizations seeking financial returns and social benefits who need reliable ways to measure social impact per dollar.
👥Students and Harvard Students: Future financial and social market participants asking how to make money and make a difference.

Source & Submitter

Source:https://www.wsj.com/opinion/how-do-investors-measure-soci...

Period: to

Published:

👤

Given name:Owen

Surname:Ambur

Email:Owen.Ambur@verizon.net

Vision

A financial ecosystem where investors can reliably identify, compare, and fund the greatest social impact per dollar to expand economic opportunity.

Mission

To develop a common standard and research-based metric for measuring social impact, enabling investors to identify funds delivering the greatest social benefit per dollar, reward them with capital, and expand economic opportunity.

Values

Effectiveness: Delivering measurable and maximized social benefit per dollar of invested capital.
Rigor: Applying rigorous economic research designs, counterfactual analysis, and transparent assumptions to social accounting.
Transparency: Making underlying valuation methods, costs, and estimates explicitly clear to avoid inflated impact claims.
Collaboration: Sharing research databases, evidence, and portfolio assessments across the impact investing community to improve estimates for everyone.

Goal 1: Standardization🔗

Establish a common standard and rigorous accounting methodology for measuring social return on investment.
Other Information
Addresses the problem where measuring quantities (students educated, patients treated, emissions avoided) varies widely and lacks a comparable monetary benchmark to decide where funds do the most good.

Objective 1.1: Difference🔗

Identify what difference a company's product makes in people's lives using a rigorous research design that establishes the counterfactual.
Other Information
Must establish what would have happened without the program to avoid crediting companies with outcomes participants would have achieved anyway.

Objective 1.2: Valuation🔗

Calculate what the difference created by a product is worth in dollars by accounting for costs, economic research translations, and assumptions like the valuation of a statistical life.
Other Information
Translates additional earnings, health outcomes, clean air, and primary education into dollar values while making underlying valuation assumptions clear.

Goal 2: Multiplication🔗

Implement the social money multiplier metric to quantify and allocate benefits per dollar invested.
Other Information
The metric estimates the benefit per person in dollars, multiplies by people reached, discounts future benefits to present value, accounts for uncertainty, subtracts costs and harms, and allocates benefits according to ownership divided by the amount invested.

Objective 2.1: Measurement🔗

Measure the social impact of portfolio companies and evaluate diverse opportunities ranging from job training to health and environmental initiatives.
Other Information
Recognizes that some sectors (like vegan restaurants or indirect health paths) have less direct paths from product to outcome and require robust economic research and shared evidence.

Objective 2.2: Collaboration🔗

Build a research database and foster greater collaboration allowing investors to assess portfolios, test assumptions, and improve estimates for everyone.
Other Information
Directing $1.57 trillion toward investments delivering the greatest social benefit would be a monumental achievement and attract additional capital from investors seeking evidence.