Pay for success (PFS) shifts the risk of funding a program from traditional funders (usually a government) to investors that are repaid if the intervention achieves predetermined outcomes. PFS doesn’t work for all programs or in all contexts (Milner et al. 2016). At a minimum, practitioners need to decide whether expected outcomes can be measured and agree upon a performance threshold for repayment. Effectively addressing these two factors is a complex process, which is why it is common to begin any proposed PFS project with a feasibility study.

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