251. Drought in the city: The economic impact of water scarcity in Latin American metropolitan areas.
- Author
-
Desbureaux, Sébastien and Rodella, Aude-Sophie
- Subjects
- *
WATER shortages , *METROPOLITAN areas , *DROUGHTS , *CLIMATE change , *CITIES & towns , *RURAL-urban migration , *LABOR market , *ECONOMICS ,LATIN American economy, 1982- - Abstract
Highlights • We quantify the impact of droughts on labor market outcomes in 78 large Latin American urban areas. • Large droughts decrease the general level of employment (∼1%), the number of hours worked (∼4.5%) and labor incomes (∼6.5%). • Informal workers are the most affected by droughts. • The impact of drought is significantly larger than the impact of comparable large wet shocks ("floods"). • Power outages and a deterioration of health are two mechanisms which explain our results. Abstract While the harmful impact of droughts is well-documented in rural areas, how droughts affect cities' economies remains an open question. Using monthly labour force surveys from 78 cities in Latin America, we demonstrate that large sustained dry events decrease the probability of being employed, hourly wages, hours worked, and labour incomes. Informal workers are impacted the most. We highlight that the impact of droughts is larger than the impact of wet events, like those that cause floods. Health and power outages are two pathways explaining our results. Climate change will increase the occurrence of droughts, making our findings particularly relevant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2019
- Full Text
- View/download PDF