Flood Risk and Firm Location Decisions in the Fed's Second District

Abstract

The intensity, duration, and frequency of flooding have increased over the past few decades. According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), 99 percent of U.S. counties have been impacted by a flooding event since 1999. As the frequency of flood events continues to increase, the number of people, buildings, and agriculture exposed to flood risk is only likely to grow. As a previous post points out, measuring the geographical accuracy of such risk is important and may impact bank lending. In this post, we focus on the distribution of flood risk within the Federal Reserve’s Second District and examine its effect on establishment location decisions over the last two decades.

To view post: https://libertystreeteconomics.newyorkfed.org/2023/11/flood-risk-and-firm-location-decisions-in-the-feds-second-district/

Keywords: climate risk, flood risk, firm location

JEL Classification: G3, Q54, R10