The Distribution and Consequences of Natural Disasters: Evidence from U.S. Wildfire Victims

For helpful comments, we thank Raj Chetty, Tatyana Deryugina, Ryan Kellogg, Pat Kline, Eleanor Krause, and Eleanor Wiseman as well as seminar participants at Georgetown University, National University of Singapore, Simon Fraser University, University of Chicago, University of Kentucky, University of Saskatechewan, the University of Virginia, University of Wyoming, Yale University, Federal Reserve Board, ETH Zurich, Environmental Defense Fund, the NBER EEE Spring meeting, the NBER Public Economics Spring Meeting and the UCSB Occasional Workshop. We thank Grant Seiter for outstanding research assistance. Any opinions and conclusions expressed herein are those of the authors and do not represent the views of the U.S. Census Bureau. The Census Bureau has ensured appropriate access and use of confidential data and has reviewed these results for disclosure avoidance protection (Project 7505723: CBDRB-FY24-CES010-005, CBDRB-FY25-CES014-013, CBDRB-FY25-CES023-017 and CBDRB-FY26-0114). Colmer is grateful to the National Science Foundation (CAREER Award SES:2338220) and the UVA Bankard Fund for Political Economy for support. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research.