Cultural resilience and economic recovery: Evidence from Hurricane Katrina

Iftekhar Hasan, Stefano Manfredonia and Felix Noth

No 16/2020, IWH Discussion Papers from Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH)

Abstract: This paper investigates the critical role of culture for economic recovery after natural disasters. Using Hurricane Katrina as our laboratory, we find a significant adverse treatment effect for plant-level productivity. However, local religious adherence and larger shares of ancestors with disaster experiences mutually mitigate this detrimental effect from the disaster. Religious adherence further dampens anxiety after Hurricane Katrina, which potentially spur economic recovery. We also detect this effect on the aggregate county level. More religious counties recover faster in terms of population, new establishments, and GDP.

Keywords: natural disasters; plant-level productivity; religion; recovery (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E23 E32 Z12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-env, nep-mac, nep-soc and nep-ure
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:iwhdps:162020

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