I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding, but wouldn't introducing tax breaks simply be reducing the problem back to financial metrics?

I think what you're talking about most closely aligns with charities, and how charities talk about their societal impact they're able to have. Even then, the discussion seems to generally come back to impact per dollar.

I'm not sure how we can replace thinking of incentives in a financial sense with their societal impact, but it would be great if we could.

I would perhaps put forth the idea of a "hours/years saved" metric vs. some next best alternative? Good luck to the accountants on this one.