The Willingness to Pay for a Cooler Day: Evidence from 50 Years of Major League Baseball Games

Kevin Kuruc, Melissa LoPalo and Sean O'Connor

American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 2025, vol. 17, issue 1, 126-59

Abstract: The climate economy literature has documented adverse effects of extreme temperatures on well-being through mechanisms such as mortality, productivity, and conflict. Impacts due simply to discomfort are less well understood. This paper investigates individuals' valuations of weather using a revealed preference approach. We first quantify the decline in attendance at Major League Baseball games on hot and cold days. Leveraging this finding coupled with the historically informed assumption of a horizontal supply curve, we infer a monetized estimate of the disutility of extreme temperatures. We estimate a $1.53 utility loss per hour of exposure to high temperatures, implying nontrivial aggregate welfare effects.

JEL-codes: D12 I31 L83 Q54 Z21 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1257/app.20220606

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