IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jrinsu/v75y2008i1p17-38.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Natural Disaster Insurance and the Equity‐Efficiency Trade‐Off

Author

Listed:
  • Pierre Picard

Abstract

This article investigates the role of private insurance in the prevention and mitigation of natural disasters. We characterize the equity‐efficiency trade‐off faced by the policymakers under imperfect information about individual prevention costs. It is shown that a competitive insurance market with actuarial rate making and compensatory tax‐subsidy transfers is likely to dominate regulated uniform insurance pricing rules or state‐funded assistance schemes. The model illustrates how targeted tax cuts on insurance contracts can improve the incentives to prevention while compensating individuals with high prevention costs. The article highlights the complementarity between individual incentives through tax cuts and collective incentives through grants to the local jurisdictions where risk management plans are enforced.

Suggested Citation

  • Pierre Picard, 2008. "Natural Disaster Insurance and the Equity‐Efficiency Trade‐Off," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 75(1), pages 17-38, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jrinsu:v:75:y:2008:i:1:p:17-38
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1539-6975.2007.00246.x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1539-6975.2007.00246.x
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/j.1539-6975.2007.00246.x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Laure Latruffe & Pierre Picard, 2005. "Assurance des catastrophes naturelles : faut-il choisir entre prévention et solidarité ?," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 78, pages 33-56.
    2. Coate, Stephen, 1995. "Altruism, the Samaritan's Dilemma, and Government Transfer Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(1), pages 46-57, March.
    3. Browne, Mark J & Hoyt, Robert E, 2000. "The Demand for Flood Insurance: Empirical Evidence," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 20(3), pages 291-306, May.
    4. Finkelstein, Amy & Poterba, James & Rothschild, Casey, 2009. "Redistribution by insurance market regulation: Analyzing a ban on gender-based retirement annuities," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(1), pages 38-58, January.
    5. Kunreuther, Howard, 1996. "Mitigating Disaster Losses through Insurance," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 12(2-3), pages 171-187, May.
    6. Lewis, Tracy & Nickerson, David, 1989. "Self-insurance against natural disasters," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 209-223, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Andor, Mark A. & Osberghaus, Daniel & Simora, Michael, 2020. "Natural Disasters and Governmental Aid: Is there a Charity Hazard?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    2. Craig E. Landry & Mohammad R. Jahan‐Parvar, 2011. "Flood Insurance Coverage in the Coastal Zone," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 78(2), pages 361-388, June.
    3. Grislain-Letrémy, Céline, 2012. "Assurance et prévention des catastrophes naturelles et technologiques," Economics Thesis from University Paris Dauphine, Paris Dauphine University, number 123456789/9073 edited by Villeneuve, Bertrand.
    4. Timo Goeschl & Shunsuke Managi, 2019. "Public in-Kind Relief and Private Self-Insurance," Economics of Disasters and Climate Change, Springer, vol. 3(1), pages 3-21, April.
    5. M. Brunette & S. Couture & J. Foncel & S. Garcia, 2020. "The decision to insure against forest fire risk: an econometric analysis combining hypothetical real data," The Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance - Issues and Practice, Palgrave Macmillan;The Geneva Association, vol. 45(1), pages 111-133, January.
    6. Paul Raschky & Reimund Schwarze & Manijeh Schwindt & Ferdinand Zahn, 2013. "Uncertainty of Governmental Relief and the Crowding out of Flood Insurance," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 54(2), pages 179-200, February.
    7. Kousky, Carolyn & Michel-Kerjan, Erwann O. & Raschky, Paul A., 2018. "Does federal disaster assistance crowd out flood insurance?," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 150-164.
    8. Aglaia Petseti & Milton Nektarios, 2012. "Proposal for a National Earthquake Insurance Programme for Greece," The Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance - Issues and Practice, Palgrave Macmillan;The Geneva Association, vol. 37(2), pages 377-400, April.
    9. Ashu Tiwari & Archana Patro, 2018. "Memory, Risk Aversion, and Nonlife Insurance Consumption: Evidence from Emerging and Developing Markets," Risks, MDPI, vol. 6(4), pages 1-17, December.
    10. repec:dau:papers:123456789/4338 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Akter, Sonia & Brouwer, Roy & Chowdhury, Saria & Aziz, Salina, 2008. "Determinants of Participation in a Catastrophe Insurance Programme: Empirical Evidence from a Developing Country," 2008 Conference (52nd), February 5-8, 2008, Canberra, Australia 5984, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    12. Meri Davlasheridze & Qing Miao, 2019. "Does Governmental Assistance Affect Private Decisions to Insure? An Empirical Analysis of Flood Insurance Purchases," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 95(1), pages 124-145.
    13. Howard Kunreuther & Erwann Michel-Kerjan, 2015. "Demand for fixed-price multi-year contracts: Experimental evidence from insurance decisions," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 51(2), pages 171-194, October.
    14. Marielle Brunette & Laure Cabantous & Stéphane Couture & Anne Stenger, 2013. "The impact of governmental assistance on insurance demand under ambiguity: a theoretical model and an experimental test," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 75(2), pages 153-174, August.
    15. Susanne Hanger & Joanne Linnerooth‐Bayer & Swenja Surminski & Cristina Nenciu‐Posner & Anna Lorant & Radu Ionescu & Anthony Patt, 2018. "Insurance, Public Assistance, and Household Flood Risk Reduction: A Comparative Study of Austria, England, and Romania," Risk Analysis, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 38(4), pages 680-693, April.
    16. Goeschl, Timo & Managi, Shunsuke, 2017. "Public in-kind relief and private self-insurance," Working Papers 0633, University of Heidelberg, Department of Economics.
    17. Shi-jie Jiang & Feiyun Xiang & Iris Yang, 2023. "Effect of Prevention Focus on the Relationships Among Driving Accident History, Risk Perception, and Consumers’ Automobile Insurance Coverage Decisions," SAGE Open, , vol. 13(3), pages 21582440231, July.
    18. Achtnicht Martin & Osberghaus Daniel, 2019. "The Demand for Index-Based Flood Insurance in a High-Income Country," German Economic Review, De Gruyter, vol. 20(2), pages 217-242, May.
    19. Osberghaus, Daniel & Reif, Christiane, 2021. "How do different compensation schemes and loss experience affect insurance decisions? Experimental evidence from two independent and heterogeneous samples," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 187(C).
    20. Ahmed Tauqeer Zahid & Farooq AhmadKhan, 2017. "Cost Mitigation of Natural Disasters through Insurance," Indian Journal of Commerce and Management Studies, Educational Research Multimedia & Publications,India, vol. 8(3), pages 16-25, September.
    21. Marielle Brunette & Stéphane Couture & Serge S. Garcia, 2011. "Determinants of insurance demand against forest fire risk: Evidence from experimental and real world data," Post-Print hal-01191123, HAL.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jrinsu:v:75:y:2008:i:1:p:17-38. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ariaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.