Aircraft Noise, Health, and Residential Sorting: Evidence from Two Quasi-Experiments

31 Pages Posted: 4 Jul 2012 Last revised: 5 Oct 2012

See all articles by Stefan Boes

Stefan Boes

University of Lucerne

Stephan Nüesch

University of Münster

Steven Stillman

Free University of Bozen-Bolzano; IZA Institute of Labor Economics

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: October 5, 2012

Abstract

We explore two unexpected changes in flight regulations to estimate the causal effect of aircraft noise on health. Detailed measures of noise are linked with longitudinal data on individual health outcomes based on the exact address information. Controlling for individual and spatial heterogeneity, we find that aircraft noise significantly increases sleeping problems and headaches. Models that do not control for such heterogeneity substantially underestimate the negative health effects, which suggests that individuals self-select into residence based on their unobserved sensitivity to noise. Our study demonstrates that the combination of quasi-experimental variation and panel data is very powerful for identifying causal effects in epidemiological field studies.

Keywords: Health, noise pollution, selection bias, fixed effects, quasi-experimental data

JEL Classification: I10, Q53, C23

Suggested Citation

Boes, Stefan and Nüesch, Stephan and Stillman, Steven, Aircraft Noise, Health, and Residential Sorting: Evidence from Two Quasi-Experiments (October 5, 2012). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2099048 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2099048

Stefan Boes

University of Lucerne ( email )

Frohburgstrasse 3
P.O. Box 4466
Lucerne, Lucerne CH - 6002
Switzerland

Stephan Nüesch (Contact Author)

University of Münster ( email )

Schlossplatz 2
Muenster, D-48149
Germany

HOME PAGE: http://www.wiwi.uni-muenster.de/uf

Steven Stillman

Free University of Bozen-Bolzano ( email )

Via Sernesi 1
39100 Bozen-Bolzano (BZ), Bozen 39100
Italy

IZA Institute of Labor Economics

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany

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