Griffin Supports Bill to Combat Poverty in America

Press Release

Congressman Tim Griffin (AR-02) issued the following statement regarding the Social Impact Bond Act (H.R. 4885) introduced yesterday by Reps. Todd Young (R-IN) and John Delaney (D-MD):

"By establishing end goals and using proven results to evaluate social and public health programs, this bipartisan and innovative bill enables public and private sector collaboration to improve these programs, which will better serve Americans in need while respecting hardworking taxpayer dollars. I recently met with UK officials about the successful use of social impact bonds in the United Kingdom and how real savings can be achieved if we implement them at the federal level here in America. I thank my friend and Ways and Means colleague Congressman Young for his work on this issue, and I will continue efforts to promote this legislation and pursue solutions to combat poverty in America."

Rep. Griffin is an original cosponsor of H.R. 4885, legislation that would foster the creation of public-private partnerships that harness philanthropic and other private sector investments to scale up scientifically proven social and public health programs.

Under the proposed legislation, the federal government would establish desired outcomes to pressing social challenges that, if achieved, would improve lives and save government money. State and municipal governments could then submit proposals to work towards those outcomes--such as increasing adoption rates of teenagers in foster care or improving the health and mortality rates of infants born into low-income families--by scaling up existing, scientifically proven interventions. Private sector investors would provide the capital needed to expand the existing programs, and, if an independent evaluator were able to validate that the desired outcomes were met and money was saved, the investors would be paid back their initial investment plus a small return from the realized government savings.

Though already widely used in the United Kingdom, social impact bonds have only been utilized on a very limited scale in the United States. H.R. 4885 is the first detailed proposal to adapt the social impact bond model for broad use at the federal level and the first proposal to incentivize the realization of savings across multiple layers of government (i.e., federal, state and local).

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