Social impact bonds are a promising new approach to government financing of social service programs. By combining performance-based payments and market discipline, pay-for-success contracts using social impact bonds have the potential to improve results, overcome barriers to social innovation, and encourage investments in cost-saving preventive services.
Established with support from the Rockefeller Foundation, the Harvard Kennedy School’s social impact bond technical assistance lab (SIB Lab) conducts research on how governments can foster social innovation and improve the results they obtain with their social spending. An important part of our research model involves providing pro bono technical assistance to state and local governments implementing pay-for-success contracts using social impact bonds. Through this hands-on involvement, we gain insights into the barriers that governments face and the solutions that can overcome the barriers. By engaging current students and recent graduates in this effort, we are able to provide experiential learning as well. Over the past year, the SIB lab has helped Massachusetts and New York become the first US state governments to develop pay-for-success contracts using social impact bonds.
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SIB Lab Staff
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Jeffrey Liebman, SIB Lab Director
Jeffrey Liebman is the Malcolm Wiener Professor of Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School where he teaches courses in social policy, public sector economics, and American economic policy. In his research, he studies tax and budget policy, social insurance, poverty, and income inequality. During the first two years of the Obama Administration, Liebman served at OMB, first as Executive Associate Director and Chief Economist and then as Acting Deputy Director. From 1998 to 1999, Liebman served as Special Assistant to the President for economic policy and coordinated the Clinton Administration’s Social Security reform technical working group. For the past two years, he has been providing pro bono assistance to state and local governments interested in implementing pay for success contracts using social impact bonds.
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Alina Sellman, Program Manager
Alina Sellman is responsible for communications, recruitment and coordination of the SIB lab’s projects, including the expansion of the lab to serve four additional states. Alina spent three years working for the Ministry of Justice as a participant of the UK Civil Service’s leadership development program, where she gained experience of a variety of government roles, including operational delivery, change management and policy development. She has also completed internships at the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, where she worked with the Performance, Accountability and Transparency team, and the civic engagement non-profit organization MassVOTE. Alina graduated from the University of Warwick in 2008 with a BA (hons) in German and English Literature.
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Hanna Azemati, Government Innovation Fellow – New York
Hanna Azemati is helping New York State with its social impact bond initiative. She completed her undergraduate studies in economics with a minor in government from Dartmouth College in 2007 and recently graduated from Yale University with an MA in International Relations. Prior to Yale, Hanna was a financial analyst at Citigroup in New York and a fellow for Kiva Microfunds in Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda. At Yale, she was a teaching fellow, a research assistant, and an editor of two academic journals. Hanna has also conducted independent research in Iran and Turkey and participated in a national policy workshop in Angola. Hanna was born in Iran and grew up in Germany.
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Ryan Gillette, Government Innovation Fellow – Massachusetts
Ryan Gillette is working in the Massachusetts Executive Office of Administration and Finance. He is the lead on the Commonwealth’s Social Innovation Financing initiatives, which plan to use pay-for-success contracts to tackle problems such as chronic homelessness and youth recidivism. Prior to his work with Administration and Finance, he worked at the National Bureau of Economic Research on the final evaluation of HUD’s Moving to Opportunity voucher study and with the federal Office of Management and Budget on healthcare cost forecasting. He holds a BA in Economics and Russian from Middlebury College and a Masters in Public Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.
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Avi Feller, Statistician
Avi Feller is a doctoral student in the Harvard Statistics Department, where he applies statistical methods to questions of public policy. He is helping develop rigorous and robust evaluation methodologies for SIB projects. Prior to Harvard, Avi served as Special Assistant to Office of Management and Budget Directors Peter Orszag and Jack Lew and was a research associate at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Avi earned an MS in Applied Statistics as a Rhodes Scholar at the University of Oxford and holds a BA in Political Science and Applied Mathematics from Yale University.
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Wayne Sandholtz, Research Assistant
Wayne Sandholtz is providing data analysis support to the Massachusetts youth recidivism pay-for-success project. In prior work, he conducted a project evaluation for Fundación Pro Vivienda Social in Argentina and managed field experiments in Uganda and the United States. He graduated from Brigham Young University with a BA in economics, and he plans to pursue a PhD in economics.
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Student Affiliates
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Thomas Dermine
Thomas Dermine is working to establish the social impact bond model in continental Europe. As part of his Policy Analysis Exercise at the Harvard Kennedy School, Thomas is working with a small team in Belgium to analyze social impact bond opportunities. His efforts are focused on adult recidivism, workforce empowerment, and chronic homelessness. Prior to joining the Kennedy School, Thomas worked as a consultant for McKinsey & Company in Europe advising institutional clients and governments on financial and regulatory issues. He also interned in the Belgian Government. Thomas holds a Master’s degree in Business Economics and a BA in Economics and Political Science from the Free University of Brussels.
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Katherine Klem
Katherine Klem is helping Massachusetts explore a third social impact bond while she completes the Master in Public Policy program as a Dubin Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School. Her background is rooted in public health. Katherine founded a nonprofit organization rallying youth for socially just tobacco policies and worked in the office of Colorado Governor John W. Hickenlooper on Affordable Care Act implementation. Katherine earned a B.A. with High Distinction from the University of Virginia and was named a US White House Presidential Scholar.
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Tyler Jaeckel
Tyler Jaeckel is helping to evaluate whether the SIB model would be feasible within Colorado. Tyler is Root-Tilden Kern Scholar at New York University Law School and a Taubman Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School. He has worked in various levels of government, including the Office of Mayor Michael Bloomberg, the Senate Banking Committee, and the Executive Office of the President. He is originally from Colorado and is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Northwestern University.
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SIB Lab Alumni
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Michael Belinsky is an alum of the HKS SIB Lab, where he helped the Massachusetts Executive Office of Administration and Finance design the youth recidivism social impact bond. He currently is the Founding Partner at Instiglio, a nonprofit organization dedicated to structuring social impact bonds in developing countries. Prior to Instiglio, Michael worked at Advanced Analytical providing economic and statistical consulting to corporations and law firms. Michael holds an MPP from Harvard Kennedy School and an AB in economics and government from Dartmouth College.
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Angela Wyse is an alum of the HKS SIB Lab, where she helped the Massachusetts Executive Office of Administration and Finance design the youth recidivism social impact bond. She is currently a Foreign Service Officer and is serving in the public affairs section of the U.S. Consulate General in Casablanca, Morocco. A former Thomas R. Pickering Foreign Affairs Fellow, Angela holds an MPP from the Harvard Kennedy School and a BA in Public Policy from the University of Michigan.
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