ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the outputs, or the What of public policymaking. Outputs are the products of policy production. Policy outputs are things that governments and their agents deliver to the public. The targets of public policy are groups or classes of individuals and not specific individuals. Policymakers delivering services over time often make a distinction between interim and final deliverables. Individual goods are the kinds of goods one typically buy in the marketplace. Collective goods 'are used simultaneously by many people and no one can be excluded from enjoying them'. Policy tools are the means that policy programs use to make an impact on society. The literature on policy outputs is vast and growing because outputs are where the rubber meets the road in the world of public policymaking. Policy outputs have been a cause as well as a consequence of the modernization of American society.
