Managed retreat - the relocation of households or infrastructure out of harm’s way - is one of the most frequently recommended policies to reduce exposure to future losses from disasters. After the 2011 Christchurch earthquake in New Zealand, around 16000 people were relocated from their...

People are sometimes forced to move, and it has often been hypothesised that such relocation involves significant psychological costs. The challenge in identifying the mental health consequences of moving is that most moves are (partly) voluntary. We use a natural experiment, the mandated...

Natural disasters have a statistically observable adverse impact on the macro-economy in the short-run. Not surprisingly, costlier events cause more pronounced slowdowns in production. Yet, interestingly, developing countries, and smaller economies, face much larger output declines following a...