IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/pubeco/v93y2009i3-4p620-633.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Valuing flood disasters using the life satisfaction approach

Author

Listed:
  • Luechinger, Simon
  • Raschky, Paul A.

Abstract

This paper argues that life satisfaction data can be used to value natural disasters. We discuss the strengths of this approach, compare it to traditional methods and apply it to estimate and monetize utility losses caused by floods in 16 European countries between 1973 and 1998. Using combined cross-section and time-series data, we find a negative impact of floods on life satisfaction that is sizeable, robust and significant. The estimates are comparable to price discounts found in housing markets. In an exploratory analysis, we find that risk transfer mechanisms such as mandatory insurance have large mitigating effects.

Suggested Citation

  • Luechinger, Simon & Raschky, Paul A., 2009. "Valuing flood disasters using the life satisfaction approach," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(3-4), pages 620-633, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:pubeco:v:93:y:2009:i:3-4:p:620-633
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047-2727(08)00153-9
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Blanchflower, David G. & Oswald, Andrew J., 2004. "Well-being over time in Britain and the USA," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(7-8), pages 1359-1386, July.
    2. Reimund Schwarze & Gert G. Wagner, 2004. "In the Aftermath of Dresden: New Directions in German Flood Insurance," The Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance, The International Association for the Study of Insurance Economics, vol. 29(2), pages 154-168, April.
    3. Andrew E. Clark, 2003. "Unemployment as a Social Norm: Psychological Evidence from Panel Data," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 21(2), pages 289-322, April.
    4. Bruno S. Frey & Alois Stutzer, 2002. "What Can Economists Learn from Happiness Research?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 40(2), pages 402-435, June.
    5. Oswald, Andrew J. & Powdthavee, Nattavudh, 2008. "Does happiness adapt? A longitudinal study of disability with implications for economists and judges," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(5-6), pages 1061-1077, June.
    6. Bernard M.S. van Praag & Paul Frijters, 1999. "The measurement of welfare and well-being; the Leyden approach," School of Economics and Finance Discussion Papers and Working Papers Series 071a, School of Economics and Finance, Queensland University of Technology.
    7. Frey, Bruno S & Stutzer, Alois, 2000. "Happiness, Economy and Institutions," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 110(466), pages 918-938, October.
    8. Robert J. MacCulloch & Rafael Di Tella & Andrew J. Oswald, 2001. "Preferences over Inflation and Unemployment: Evidence from Surveys of Happiness," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(1), pages 335-341, March.
    9. Daniel Kahneman & Robert Sugden, 2005. "Experienced Utility as a Standard of Policy Evaluation," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 32(1), pages 161-181, September.
    10. Alesina, Alberto & Di Tella, Rafael & MacCulloch, Robert, 2004. "Inequality and happiness: are Europeans and Americans different?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(9-10), pages 2009-2042, August.
    11. Van Praag, Bernard M. S., 1988. "Climate equivalence scales : An application of a general method," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 1019-1024, April.
    12. Thomas A. Garrett & Russell S. Sobel, 2003. "The Political Economy of FEMA Disaster Payments," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 41(3), pages 496-509, July.
    13. Richard Carson & Nicholas Flores & Norman Meade, 2001. "Contingent Valuation: Controversies and Evidence," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 19(2), pages 173-210, June.
    14. Rosen, Sherwin, 1974. "Hedonic Prices and Implicit Markets: Product Differentiation in Pure Competition," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 82(1), pages 34-55, Jan.-Feb..
    15. Don N. MacDonald & James C. Murdoch & Harry L. White, 1987. "Uncertain Hazards, Insurance, and Consumer Choice: Evidence from Housing Markets," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 63(4), pages 361-371.
    16. Richard Layard, 2006. "Happiness and Public Policy: a Challenge to the Profession," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 116(510), pages 24-33, March.
    17. Jonathan H. Mark, 1980. "A Preference Approach to Measuring the Impact of Environmental Externalities," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 56(1), pages 103-116.
    18. David M. Harrison & Greg T. Smersh & Arthur L. Schwartz, Jr, 2001. "Environmental Determinants of Housing Prices: The Impact of Flood Zone Status," Journal of Real Estate Research, American Real Estate Society, vol. 21(1/2), pages 3-20.
    19. Rafael Di Tella & Robert MacCulloch, 2006. "Some Uses of Happiness Data in Economics," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 20(1), pages 25-46, Winter.
    20. Erzo F. P. Luttmer, 2005. "Neighbors as Negatives: Relative Earnings and Well-Being," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 120(3), pages 963-1002.
    21. Di Tella, Rafael & MacCulloch, Robert, 2008. "Gross national happiness as an answer to the Easterlin Paradox?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(1), pages 22-42, April.
    22. Alan B. Krueger & Aaron Siskind, 1998. "Assessing the Bias in the Consumer Price Index from Survey Data," NBER Working Papers 6450, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    23. Bernard M. S. van Praag & Barbara E. Baarsma, 2005. "Using Happiness Surveys to Value Intangibles: The Case of Airport Noise," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 115(500), pages 224-246, January.
    24. Tavares, Jose, 2004. "The open society assesses its enemies: shocks, disasters and terrorist attacks," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(5), pages 1039-1070, July.
    25. Miles Kimball & Helen Levy & Fumio Ohtake & Yoshiro Tsutsui, 2006. "Unhappiness after Hurricane Katrina," NBER Working Papers 12062, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    26. Kunreuther, Howard, 1996. "Mitigating Disaster Losses through Insurance," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 12(2-3), pages 171-187, May.
    27. Kapteyn, Arie, 1994. "The Measurement of Household Cost Functions: Revealed Preference versus Subjective Measures," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 7(4), pages 333-350, November.
    28. Driscoll Paul & Dietz Brian & Alwang Jeffrey, 1994. "Welfare Analysis When Budget Constraints Are Nonlinear: The Case of Flood Hazard Reduction," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 181-199, March.
    29. Gruber Jonathan H & Mullainathan Sendhil, 2005. "Do Cigarette Taxes Make Smokers Happier," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 5(1), pages 1-45, July.
    30. Matthew Rabin, 1998. "Psychology and Economics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 36(1), pages 11-46, March.
    31. Austin Troy & Jeff Romm, 2004. "Assessing the price effects of flood hazard disclosure under the California natural hazard disclosure law (AB 1195)," Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(1), pages 137-162.
    32. Welsch, Heinz, 2002. "Preferences over Prosperity and Pollution: Environmental Valuation Based on Happiness Surveys," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(4), pages 473-494.
    33. Okmyung Biny & Stephen Polasky, 2004. "Effects of Flood Hazards on Property Values: Evidence Before and After Hurricane Floyd," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 80(4).
    34. John C. Harsanyi, 1955. "Cardinal Welfare, Individualistic Ethics, and Interpersonal Comparisons of Utility," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 63, pages 309-309.
    35. Howard Kunreuther & Mark Pauly, 2004. "Neglecting Disaster: Why Don't People Insure Against Large Losses?," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 28(1), pages 5-21, January.
    36. Ferrer-i-Carbonell, Ada, 2005. "Income and well-being: an empirical analysis of the comparison income effect," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(5-6), pages 997-1019, June.
    37. von Ungern-Sternberg, Thomas, 2004. "Efficient Monopolies: The Limits of Competition in the European Property Insurance Market," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199268818.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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:eee:pubeco:v:93:y:2009:i:3-4:p:620-633. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Dana Niculescu). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/505578 .

    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 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.

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.