Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/278951 
Year of Publication: 
2023
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 16253
Publisher: 
Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
We provide the first revealed preference estimates of the benefits of routine weather forecasts. The benefits come from how people use advance information to reduce mortality from heat and cold. Theoretically, more accurate forecasts reduce mortality if and only if mortality risk is convex in forecast errors. We test for such convexity using data on the universe of mortality events and weather forecasts for a twelve-year period in the U.S. Results show that erroneously mild forecasts increase mortality whereas erroneously extreme forecasts do not reduce mortality. Making forecasts 50% more accurate would save 2,200 lives per year. The public would be willing to pay $112 billion to make forecasts 50% more accurate over the remainder of the century, of which $22 billion reflects how forecasts facilitate adaptation to climate change.
Subjects: 
weather forecasts
information provision
mortality
climate change
JEL: 
D83
I12
Q51
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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