Impact EntrepreneurThe Impact Entrepreneur Breakthrough → Book Hub

The Prevention Ledger · impactentrepreneur.com/prevention-ledger · figures follow The Impact Entrepreneur Breakthrough (Berrett-Koehler, 2026)

PUBLIC BETA · v0.9.4

The Prevention Ledger

Prevention Ratio™ Calculator & Prevention Dividend™ Evidence Explorer — an interactive companion to The Impact Entrepreneur Breakthrough

Read your ledger ↓

Every institution keeps a ledger it rarely reads: the split between what it spends reacting to crises and what it spends preventing them. Most discover that only 10 to 20 percent of their security-related spending addresses root causes — the rest arrives after the harm. This instrument lets you read your own ledger in minutes, then shows what the published evidence says movement is worth.

Everything here runs in your browser. Nothing you enter is stored, sent, or seen by anyone but you — and refreshing the page clears it all.

Part One

The Prevention Ratio™

The Prevention Ratio™ is the share of security-related spending directed to prevention rather than reaction. Compute a quick estimate in under a minute, or work through the guided categories for a closer reading.

In your currency — the units don't matter, the ratio does. Include response, insurance, enforcement, resilience, and prevention programs.
Spending that addresses root causes before harm occurs — resilience, ecosystems, community health, workforce, governance.
10%
Semicircular gauge showing your Prevention Ratio against the 10 to 20 percent band where most institutions land.

—

Enter figures above to read your ledger.

The teal bracket marks where most institutions land on first measurement (10–20% preventive), per The Impact Entrepreneur Breakthrough. Scale shown to 0.50.

You now know your ratio. The evidence below is what movement is worth.

Read the evidence ↓

This instrument accompanies The Impact Entrepreneur Breakthrough (Berrett-Koehler, 2026) — the book behind the framework. About this work

Part Two

The Prevention Dividend™

The Prevention Dividend™ is the return generated when spending shifts from reaction to prevention. The findings below follow the book exactly — and preserve a discipline the numbers deserve: not every return is the same kind of number.

Benefit–cost ratio Annual rate of return Averted-loss estimate

An illustrative reallocation

Illustrative, not predictive

Choose a domain and a hypothetical annual amount shifted from reaction to prevention. The range below is what the published evidence suggests such a shift tends to return — actual results depend on baseline, context, and implementation.

In your currency.
4M – 7M

Evidence-supported range of avoided costs, conservative end first. Source: National Institute of Building Sciences, Natural Hazard Mitigation Saves (2019).

The Chapter 7 canvas asks what would change if a tenth of your reactive spending moved upstream. This sets the shift to 10% of the reactive figures you entered in Part One.

The pandemic-preparedness figure is an averted-loss estimate — a different kind of number — and is therefore shown above but not modeled here. Early childhood education is likewise shown but not modeled: its return is an annual percentage rate, not a dollar multiple. Conflict prevention is a single published average rather than a range.

Foundation

Methodology, sources & the fine print

About this work

The Prevention Ledger was developed by Laurie Lane-Zucker, who introduced the Prevention Ratio™ and the Prevention Dividend™ in The Impact Entrepreneur Breakthrough (Berrett-Koehler, 2026). It is the first public instrument of a larger body of work on prevention economics: the measurement standard is open, and this page is its working expression.

The book's Chapter 7 canvas carries the same measure onto paper for workshops and classrooms; the Instructor's Supplement and the Educators page support course use. Feedback and inquiries reach the developer directly at info@impactalchemist.com.

How the Prevention Ratio™ is computed

Prevention Ratio™ = preventive spending ÷ (preventive + reactive spending). The guided worksheet uses ten principle-level categories — five reactive, five preventive — drawn from the framework introduced in The Impact Entrepreneur Breakthrough. It is deliberately simplified: the full assessment taxonomy used in practice is more granular, and classification of mixed line items requires judgment this public instrument does not attempt. Figures are currency-agnostic; the ratio is what matters. Results are approximations for orientation and conversation, not audited findings.

Where the figures come from

Every figure follows the book and its chapter endnotes 17–21: disaster preparedness returns $4–$7 per $1 (National Institute of Building Sciences, Natural Hazard Mitigation Saves: 2019 Report); ecosystem restoration $7–$30 (Ding et al., World Resources Institute, 2018; corroborated by OECD, 2019); early childhood education a 7–13% annual rate of return (Heckman et al., 2010; García et al., 2020); pandemic preparedness $1,102 in expected averted GDP loss per $1, a U.S. estimate (Jameel Institute, Imperial College London, 2023); and conflict prevention $16 saved per $1 (United Nations & World Bank, Pathways for Peace, 2018). The 10–20% context band and the framing above also follow the book. Global military expenditure reached approximately $2.9 trillion in 2025 (SIPRI, April 2026).

What this instrument is — and is not

The Prevention Ledger is an educational instrument accompanying The Impact Entrepreneur Breakthrough. It produces approximate, illustrative figures from published research and the numbers you enter. It is not professional, financial, legal, or engineering advice; it makes no institution-specific recommendation; and its outputs are properly read as ranges with stated context — never as guarantees. No warranty of any kind is made regarding results or their application.

Privacy

All computation happens in your browser. This page stores nothing — no accounts, no cookies, no local storage, no analytics of your entries. Refreshing the page clears every figure. The optional waitlist below is handled by our existing newsletter infrastructure; this page itself collects nothing.

Changelog

v0.9.4 · August 2026 — Launch-week pass: links to the book hub and an “About this work” note; outbound source links on every evidence card; the context band redrawn so it stays visible at every ratio; the computation shown beneath the result; copy-summary and print; the book's “10% Redirect” as a reallocation preset; sharing metadata. No changes to figures or computation. v0.9.3 · August 2026 — Early childhood education corrected to its true metric class: shown as a 7–13% annual rate of return (the prior display conflated it with a $7–$13 benefit–cost ratio) and removed from the illustrative reallocation model accordingly; matches the corrected book text (ebook current; print correction in production). v0.9.2 · August 2026 — Feedback address configured (info@impactalchemist.com); no other changes. v0.9.1 · August 2026 — Theme-aware rendering: designed light and dark themes; no changes to copy, figures, or computation. v0.9 · August 2026 — Public beta: Prevention Ratio™ Calculator (Quick Estimate and Guided Entry), Prevention Dividend™ Evidence Explorer, illustrative reallocation. Peer benchmarking is the next horizon.

Be first to the benchmark

Peer benchmarking is the next horizon — where your ratio sits among comparable institutions. Be first to know when it arrives. You'll also receive the weekly Impact Entrepreneur newsletter; unsubscribe any time.

This is a beta — tell us

What's unclear, broken, or missing? Two lines from you makes the next version better.

info@impactalchemist.com

Developed by Laurie Lane-Zucker; introduced in The Impact Entrepreneur Breakthrough (Berrett-Koehler, 2026).