Natural disasters and relief assistance: Empirical evidence on the resilience of U.S. counties using dynamic propensity score matching

Abstract

This paper utilizes a novel dynamic propensity score matching approach for multiple cohorts of U.S. counties between 1989 and 1999 to examine local economy resilience to rare natural disasters. Affected counties are sorted based on disaster intensity and are carefully matched to similar counties that did not experience a disaster. A difference-in-difference estimator compares trends of affected counties' postdisaster business establishments, employment, and payroll to counterfactual trends in the matched counties.All affected counties experienced short-run drops in economic activity that was particularly noticeable in higher-intensity disasters. In the longer run, less distressed counties returned to their estimated counterfactual trends, but counties with lower predisaster socioeconomic conditions still lagged in growth, particularly in cases of lowerintensity disasters. Policymakers can use this information to better prepare responses to future disasters. K E Y W O R D Sdisaster recovery, economic development, natural disasters, propensity score matching, resilience

Earthquakes, grants, and public expenditure: How municipalities respond to natural disasters

“…Our evidence suggests a more efficient recovery in northern municipalities which allows both personal income and housing prices to grow faster than if no earthquake would have occurred, as suggested by Barone and Mocetti (). These findings are consistent with Bondonio and Greenbaum () showing that more socio‐economically disadvantaged areas (the South) are less able to exploit opportunities to recover. Indeed, while the response of northern municipalities encompasses all areas of government action, southern municipalities put their effort mainly in the enhancement of local services.…”

“…Damages from natural disasters may provide the opportunity to reorganize economic activities in affected areas and, therefore, to foster urban development (Xu & Wang, ). However, areas with better predisaster socioeconomic conditions are more capable to exploit this opportunity as compared to areas with worse predisaster conditions (Bondonio & Greenbaum, ). Looking at two Italian regions struck by severe earthquakes in 1976 and 1980, Barone and Mocetti () show that in the medium run (i.e., the first 5 years after the disaster) transfers from the central government allow to entirely cover the losses, but remarkable differences are observed between the two regions in terms of ability to recover.…”

The Illusion of Urbanization: Impact of Administrative Reform on Communities’ Resilience

“…Finally, our research also adds to the handful of studies which explicitly address causality in exploring urban or rural resilience (Bondonio and Greenbaum 2018, for example). To our knowledge, our paper is the first to identify causal effects of an administrative reform aimed at transforming rural settlements into towns on various types of resilience.…”

The Impact of Degree Duration on Higher Education Participation: Evidence from a Large‐scale Natural Experiment

“…Such combination of a PSM approach with a difference-in-difference scheme has precedents in the policyevaluation literature (e.g Becker et al, 2012;Bondonio and Greenbaum, 2018…”