Empirical Analysis

Abstract

Several studies have examined economic resilience empirically or with the use of simulation studies. The major pioneer is Tierney (Impacts of recent disasters on businesses: the 1993 Midwest floods and the 1994 Northridge earthquake. In: Jones B (ed) Economic consequences of earthquakes: preparing for the unexpected. Buffalo, National Center for Earthquake Engineering Research, pp 189–222, 1997), who surveyed businesses in the aftermath of the Northridge Earthquake and Midwest Floods. Rose and Lim (Environ Hazards Hum Soc Dimens 4:1–14, 2002) translated Tierney’s findings into specific measures of resilience of the Los Angeles electricity system. They identified such factors as time-of-day-use, electricity “importance,” and production recapture as key to understanding why businesses that averaged an X % reduction of electricity were able to continue operation with much less than an X % reduction in their production goods and services. In fact, they found that these micro-level tactics resulted in a reduction of business interruption losses by more than 90 %, percent of baseline estimates, a reduction consistent with Tierneys’ survey responses.