Archive – Risk Center Media

April 26, 2022. Poets and Quants. For This Wharton Course, The Outdoors Is The Classroom.  Prof. Sarah Light is heading a new Climate and Environmental Leadership in Action course: “Student interest … has increased dramatically in the intersection of environments and business, specifically with respect to climate.”

March 17, 2022. E&E News. Where Rising Seas Threaten Drinking Water, Scientists Look for Affordable Solutions.  Risk Center affiliate Allison Lassiter is spearheading a new research effort that aims to identify vulnerable water systems along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts where rising seas pose water quality risks and develop strategies that can make utilities more resilient to saltwater intrusion. “Besides being unpleasant to drink, salinized water can harm vulnerable populations, including people with hypertension and pregnant women,” Lassiter said.

January 27, 2022. Tampa Bay Times.  It won’t take the ‘perfect storm’ to wreak havoc across Tampa Bay.  Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: “We basically have no mechanism for communicating to people that risk is changing.”

January 24, 2022. USA Today. Insurance and aid aren’t covering the cost of disasters in America. Is it time to relocate? (Read for free on Yahoo!News). Carolyn Kousky is quoted:  When disaster strikes, there are typically four ways a home or business owner can recover: insurance, government relief, personal savings, or a personal loan. “Lower income people struggle with all four of those sources. So they are the ones that are consistently, disproportionately harmed by disaster events.”

November 29, 2021. Government Technology. Building Resilience for Low-Income New Yorkers Post-Disaster. Carolyn Kousky interviewed about the National Science Foundation Civic Innovation Challenge. The project’s overarching goal is to increase the financial resilience of low- and moderate-income (LMI) households in New York City to escalating flood risk through the use of inclusive insurance.

November 5, 2021. WBUR. How insurance is protecting a coral reef from climate impacts in Mexico.  Here & Now‘s Scott Tong talks with Carolyn Kousky about how parametric insurance benefits people after natural disasters. (Audio option, 10 min.)

October 28, 2021. Marketplace. The changing climate is driving up home insurance claims, and rates.  Carolyn Kousky: Changing climate makes extreme weather more common These trends are making it more difficult for insurers to offer coverage, or offer it at a price point that people can afford.

October 25, 2021.  Knowledge@Wharton.  Beyond Business: Tackling the Climate Crisis. Can Business Lead the Way?  (Video and article.) Panelists included Professor Benjamin Keys, who spoke about how climate change is reshaping the mortgage and housing industries, and Professor Sarah E. Light, who laid out an action plan for businesses to follow. Part of the Wharton School’s Tarnopol Dean’s Lecture Series, Beyond Business is streamed on Wharton’s LinkedIn page.

October 12, 2021. The Washington Post. White House launches climate initiatives to arm communities against floods, extreme weather. Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: “It is important to review these standards, since climate change is escalating flood risk in many places around the country…. It is critical that our building standards consider future increases in risk instead of being backward looking.”

October 12, 2021. BK Reader. Brooklyn Residents Hit Hard By Ida Could Get Flood Insurance if City Program Is Adopted. Article cites Wharton Risk Center involvement in a new pilot project that financially supports marginalized communities affected by flooding. Carolyn Kousky: “We know that many households do not get the financial resources they need to recover from disasters. With flooding increasing — as the remnants of Ida so recently reminded us — we need new solutions.”

October 6, 2021. Brooklyn Daily Eagle. Pilot project promotes `inclusive flood insurance’ in vulnerable areas. Article cites the Wharton Risk Center’s partnership with the Center for New York City Neighborhoods and the NYC Mayor’s Office of Climate Resiliency on a project to protect low- and moderate-income families against financial crisis resulting from increasing incidents of flooding.

October 4, 2021.  Connecticut Mirror. Flood insurance rules are changing, but some say not enough.  Article quotes Helen Wiley on Risk Center research into parametric microinsurance. “Because it’s using a more modern technique, you can essentially have the process be automated and people could even get a payout to their cellphones.”

September 28, 2021. NJ Spotlight News. Homeowners with ‘high risk’ for flooding may see higher insurance rates. Carolyn Kousky shares insight into FEMA’s new flood insurance rates. (Video, 4 min.)

September 16, 2021. Marketplace. Why doesn’t homeowners insurance cover flood damage? Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: “There is a group of properties that flood repeatedly, and the program keeps paying to rebuild them” That, she said, doesn’t make a whole lot of economic sense.

September 16, 2021. The Insurer. Interview with Howard Kunreuther: Climate change is uninsurable if left to the private sector alone, but working together with the public sector, we will be in a much better position to deal with these risks.” Professor Kunreuther explains what constitutes interdependent risk related to wildfires in the article: Wildfires and home insurance

September 14, 2021. The Daily Pennsylvanian. ’Warming is human activity’: Penn experts urge climate action on campus and beyond.  Article quotes Howard Kunreuther: Climate change is creating more serious problems than anyone had anticipated even one or two years ago.  Public-private partnerships must involve individuals, organizations, and countries in developing strategies to address biases and heuristics that prevent people from taking action against climate change.

September 5, 2021. NPR, All Things Considered. Climate Change Risks and Insurance Policies. NPR’s Michel Martin speaks with Howard Kunreuther about climate change’s impact on the insurance industry.  Podcast (6 min.) and transcript.

September 5, 2021. NBC10 News, Philadelphia.  Coping with the mental toll of storm damage. Carolyn Kousky: “Disasters can create financial hardships.”  Flood victims can turn to savings, loans, assistance and insurance, but using those things can also cause stress.

July 17, 2021. The New York Times. Collapse Raises New Fears about Florida’s Shaky Insurance Market. Article quotes Carolyn Kousky on rising insurance premiums: “Coastal areas all across the Gulf and … East Coast … could start to see similar dynamics.”

June 15, 2021.  Canadian Underwriter. How to convince your clients that buying insurance isn’t a waste of money. Interview with Howard Kunreuther.

June 8, 2021.  Knowledge@Wharton. How Companies Can Navigate Political Risks Successfully. Article describes research conducted by the Wharton Political Risk Lab in partnership with its inaugural sponsor, EY-Parthenon’s Geostrategic Business Group. The study, Geostrategy in Practice 2021, is the second in an annual series (last year’s report is available here).

June 1, 2021. AARP.  What You Need to Know about Climate Change: How it’s already affecting your health, home and safety.  Article quotes Ben Keys: “Housing sales in the most exposed coastal areas of Florida [are] dropping — all directly related to climate changes,” His 2020 research paper on 1.4 million real estate transactions found that the number of home sales dropped by 16 to 20 percent between 2013 and 2018 in Florida communities closest to the water. “This is a case where water can literally erode the value of your most precious investment.”

June 1, 2021. Scientific American. Biden Budget Includes Plan to Help Poor Buy Flood Insurance. Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: The pricing structure of Risk Rating 2.0 would “send better signals to markets about risk” while Biden’s aid program for policyholders would “help make sure that everyone can benefit from the financial protection of disaster insurance.”

May 21, 2021. CNBC. Off-the-grid homes are coming to your neighborhood, as climate change creates suburban survivalists. Ben Keys joins CNBC to discuss how homebuilders design and power new homes to meet new climate change demands.

April 26, 2021. Knowledge@Wharton. How to Strengthen Housing Safety Nets. Article discusses recent paper by Ben Keys and co-authors Robert Collinson and Ingrid Gould Ellen.

March 18, 2021. Forbes. FEMA’S Upcoming Changes Could Cause Flood Insurance To Soar At The Shore.  Carolyn Kousky comments on FEMA’s upcoming rating system, Risk-Rating 2.0.

March 8, 2021. NPR. Millions Of U.S. Homes Face An Expensive Flooding Threat. Podcast includes quotes by Carolyn Kousky: “Research shows that having insurance has all these follow-on impacts on well-being, like physical and mental health, the stability of families.”

March 4, 2021. Climate Wire – Extreme Weather. Flood program faces $2B annual shortfall from climate change. Article discusses research by Carolyn Kousky, Ning Lin, and Howard Kunreuther on the challenge of grandfathering in the NFIP, which allows policyholders to pay lower rates even as risks rise.

February 26, 2021. Financial Times. Waterfront designers rise to the challenge of flood risk.  Article quotes Carolyn Kousky on community design for waterfront areas.

February 22, 2021. CNN. Flood risk is growing for US homeowners due to climate change. Current insurance rates greatly underestimate the threat, a new report finds. Carolyn Kousky discusses findings that show how much flood losses are going to start increasing as a result of climate change.

February 22, 2021. Bloomberg Green. Most Americans Don’t Have Enough Flood Insurance for Climate Change. Carolyn Kousky discusses new information on flood damages available to the public.

February 22, 2021. NPR. A Looming Disaster: New Data Reveal Where Flood Damage Is an Existential Threat. “If you don’t have the finances you need to recover, then families have to make really difficult trade-offs,” says Carolyn Kousky, the executive director of the Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center at the University of Pennsylvania.

February 22, 2021. The Daily Pennsylvanian. Penn studies find text message reminders increase vaccine uptake significantly.

February 21, 2021. USA Today. Flood-prone homeowners could see major rate hikes in FEMA flood insurance changes, new study finds. Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: “There’s a focus on premiums, as if they’re somehow divorced from the underlying risk. The question should be, how do we reduce this risk?”

January 5, 2021. ClimateWire. Widespread errors’ found in federal flood insurance. Article cites research findings by the Wharton Risk Center that NFIP policyholders in Portland were sometimes paying too much for flood policies or were not advised about cost-saving changes to they could make to their policy.  Continuing education for insurance agents and reforms to the current pricing approach should help solve this problem.

December 5, 2019. The New York Times. California Bans Insurers From Dropping Policies Made Riskier by Climate Change.  Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: “If our insurers are in trouble, that jeopardizes people’s recovery.”

December 3, 2019. Climatewire.  Insurers cherry-pick homes, leave flooded ones for feds.  Article cites Risk Center research and quotes Carolyn Kousky.

November 14, 2019.  Vice.  This Is How the Climate Crisis Wipes an American Community Off the Map. Carolyn Kousky: “A lot of the federal resources aren’t available for more localized events. This can be particularly problematic with flooding, where you can see an event that’s really devastating for a small number of households and doesn’t rise to the level of getting a disaster declaration.”

October 20, 2019.  The Wall Street Journal. Insurers Aim to Fill in the Disaster Gap. Article quotes Carolyn Kousky in a discussion of parametric insurance products.  “A tropical storm with a lot of rain and flooding but not enough wind speed to count as a name hurricane could fail to trigger a payout if the insurer used a gauge like wind speed to determine reimbursements.”

October 16, 2019.  The Weather Channel. Why We Underprepare for Disasters. (Video). Howard Kunreuther discusses the decision-making obstacles that cause people to fail to prepare for extreme weather events.

September 30, 2019. NPR.  Building a better algorithm to predict flood risk in the age of climate change. (Audio). Interview with Carolyn Kousky:  The Federal Emergency Management Agency tracks flooding and dictates who needs flood insurance. But the maps don’t factor in climate change, nor do they include millions of homes that have never been mapped for flood risk.

September 18, 2019.  The Weather Underground.  (Video).  Howard Kunreuther discusses the biases that cause people to underprepare for disasters.

September 16, 2019. Knowledge@Wharton.  Curbing Climate Change: 30 Solutions That Could Make an Impact. (audio) 30 Climate Risk Solutions.Wharton’s Steven Kimbrough and Carolyn Kousky and Penn Law’s Cary Coglianese discuss the solutions offered by a new Penn-wide report on climate change.

September 15, 2019.  The Daily Beast. The Climate Crisis Is Poised to Make Huge Swaths of America Totally Uninsurable.  Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: “Many families do not have savings to repair a severely damaged home and for some, taking on debt can be burdensome or not feasible,” Kousky said. “There is really no substitute for insurance for having the needed funds quickly post-disaster to begin recovery. Unfortunately, often those who need the coverage the most are the least likely to be able to afford it.”

September 10, 2019. Knowledge@Wharton.  Expecting the Unexpected: How Companies Can Prepare Now for Calamities. Howard Kunreuther and Michael Useem explain why some firms have developed creative strategies to reduce the risk of disasters.

September 5, 2019.  Business Insider.  CEOs are suddenly having a change of heart about what their companies should stand for — and the diverging fates of 2 major corporations show why. Mike Useem: Growing evidence and experience suggest that investing for the long term is better for shareholders.

August 23, 2019.  KCRW, Press Play with Madeleine Brand. With global warming comes more disasters, and insurance companies are pulling out of risky areas (podcast)

August 20, 2019.  The New York Times.  As Wildfires Get Worse, Insurers Pull Back From Riskiest Areas

July 27, 2019.  The Hill.  Time for a new Apollo project: A climate-friendly economy. Op-ed by Carolyn Kousky: Like the Apollo project, we have about a decade. Unlike the Apollo project, failure is not an option.

July 13, 2019. The Washington Post. Even as floods worsen, Midwest towns plan new riverfront development.  Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: “Our building codes and zoning need to keep pace and account for growing risk.”

July 3, 2019. Brink News.  The Terrorism Risk Insurance Act Expires Next Year. An Expert Explains Why Congress Must Renew It.  Interview with Howard Kunreuther in conjunction with his testimony at a hearing of U.S. Senate, Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs on The Reauthorization of the Terrorism Risk Insurance Program on June 18, 2019.

June 8, 2019.  The New York Times. Even as Floods Worsen With Climate Change, Fewer People Insure Against Disaster.  Article quotes Carolyn Kousky and cites the Risk Center’s policy work on flood insurance.

April 26, 2019. Utility Dive. As California utilities falter, legislators, governor back ‘tower of finance’ solution to wildfire costs.  Carolyn Kousky contributed to a model for a catastrophic wildfire fund.  The model is backed by the Governor’s Strike Force report on wildfire mitigation solutions and is now making its way through the legislature.

April 12, 2019.  The New York Times. California Governor Seeks to Protect Utilities From the Cost of Wildfires,  Article quotes Carolyn Kousky.

April 5, 2019. Financial Management Magazine. Expanding the risk management landscape. “The big issue that has changed over the last 20 years is the interdependency of risk,” said Professor Howard Kunreuther, James G. Dinan Professor and co-director of the Risk Management and Decision Processes Center at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and a contributor to the WEF report. “It’s a global environment, which is why global risk has become such a critical issue.”

April 4, 2019.  AP News. California eyes risk pool as it struggles with costly fires. Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: California’s wildfire risk is so great now that even risk pools or catastrophe bonds aren’t attractive to investors.

March 19, 2019. Knowledge@Wharton. The 737 Max Crash: What’s the Fallout for Boeing? (podcast and transcript). Wharton’s Robert Meyer, Indiana University’s Clinton Oster and John Strong from the College of William & Mary discuss the grounding of Boeing’s 737 Max.

February 25, 2019.  Los Angeles Times. To make sure its utilities survive climate change, California needs liability law reform. Op-ed by Carolyn Kousky: “As much as global warming is to blame for PG&E’s financial woes, state policy is equally responsible. To preserve the health of its utilities, California will need to reform its strict liability laws and support better wildfire risk management.”

January 17, 2019. Brunswick Review – The Crisis Issue.  Interview with Howard Kunreuther and Michael Useem on findings from their book, Mastering Catastrophic Risk: How Companies Are Coping with Disruption.

January 10, 2019.  Knowledge@Wharton. Preparing for Disasters in 2019: How Can Risks Be Mitigated? (with audio by SiriusXM Business Radio Powered by The Wharton School.)  The year 2018 was marked by extraordinary natural disasters in the United States and around the world. Three experts — Howard Kunreuther, Robert Hartwig, and J. Keith Gilless — discuss how communities can better prepare for disasters in 2019.

December 10, 2018. Bloomberg. Corporate Assets Face Climate Risks, But Nobody Seems to Mind. Katherine Greig is quoted for her review of a recent study on adaptation disclosure. She notes the study sorts corporate adaptation strategies and tactics into descriptive categories but does not put climate risks in the context of other threats that companies face every day, like market fluctuations, technological growth, and cyber risks, or political and regulatory change.

November 29, 2018.  Bloomberg. Flood Policy Standoff Tests Democrats’ Promise of Climate Action. “We should communicate risk with a price signal,” said Katherine Greig, a senior fellow at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton Risk Center.  Greig, co-author of the National Climate Assessment’s chapter on adaptation, said it’s appropriate to worry about the impact of higher flood insurance premiums on the most vulnerable homeowners. She said the best solution is to raise rates over time, coupled with means-tested vouchers to protect people with low incomes.

November 27, 2018.  ClimateWire.  We’re not responding quickly enough.  Interview with Katherine Greig, a senior fellow at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton Risk Center and co-author of the National Climate Assessment chapter on adaptation: “Our hand is eventually going to be forced. It’s a situation where, as the saying goes, ‘Necessity is the mother of invention.’”

November 26, 2018. New York Times. Five Big Ways the United States Will Need to Adapt to Climate Change.  Article quotes Katherine Greig, senior fellow at the Wharton Risk Center and co-author of the chapter on adaptation in federal government’s new National Climate Assessment.

November 15, 2018. Bloomberg TV. Carolyn Kousky discusses the California wildfires.

November 14, 2018. Bloomberg. Californians Expected to Rebuild Burnt Homes Despite Continued Fire Risk. Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: “Recovery is so much longer and slower than people appreciate at the outset.”

November 13, 2018. Knowledge@Wharton. California Wildfires: What Will It Take to Prevent the Next Disaster? (podcast). “We need to figure out ways where the State of California, insurers, utilities and residents can take steps to reduce these losses in the future,” said Howard Kunreuther, Wharton professor of operations, information and decisions, and co-director of the school’s Risk Management and Decision Processes Center.

October 16, 2018. The Washington Post. Hurricane-proofing Florida homes is worth the cost, and then some.  Article cites research by Jeffrey Czajkowski and colleagues: homes built in coastal areas of Florida, after the implementation of the code, suffer 64 percent less damage than homes built before.

October 11, 2018. CityLab. How America Fails at Communicating Flood Risks.  Carolyn Kousky: We have good data about flood risks. The challenge is getting it to people when they need it, in a way that’s useful.

September 13, 2018. Brink News. The 3 Maps That Explain Residential Flood Insurance Purchases.  Carolyn Kousky and Brett Lingle: “In a few counties around the country, the majority of residential flood insurance is purchased by homeowners outside the highest-risk areas.”

September 12, 2018. The Washington Post. Why do people stay put during hurricanes? Here’s what psychology says. Op-ed by Robert Meyer: “Recent years have seen tremendous advances in our ability to predict natural disasters that may become increasingly common as the climate changes. But these advances have done little to reduce the damaging cost of these events. The key to better preparedness is to design preparedness measures that anticipate them.”

September 2, 2018. Quartz. The life-changing class teaching Texas kids resilience after Hurricane Harvey.  Article quotes Carolyn Kousky’s study published in The Future of Children, a biannual journal published by Princeton University and the Brookings Institution, “children can suffer psychological harm from the damage to their homes and possessions; from migration; from the grief of losing loved ones; from seeing parents or caregivers undergo stress; from neglect and abuse; and from breakdowns in social networks, neighborhoods, and local economies.”

August 31, 2018. NPR. Industry Looks For Hurricane Lessons As Climate Changes. Howard Kunreuther: “There’s a tendency for all of us — not just firms, but individuals — to be myopic,” he says, “to want to get something back in the short term to justify an investment. It often takes a disaster to get people to pay attention.”

August 24, 2018. Bloomberg TV. What’d You Miss? (video, starts at minute 53). Carolyn Kousky discusses the role of electric utilities in California’s wildfires.

August 20, 2018. RANE Network (Risk Assistance Network + Exchange). Mastering Catastrophic Risk: How Companies Are Coping with Disruption (podcast). Leading authorities on risk management, strategy, and company leadership, Howard Kunreuther and Michael Useem, provide real-world practical insights into how large companies are responding to this new reality and develops a framework for smarter thinking about events that can damage a business.

August 15, 2018. The San Diego Union-Tribune. Study says California utilities should only pay for wildfires if they are negligent. Article cites the Risk Center’s 12-page report analyzing the costs of deadly wildfires in California, and quotes Carolyn Kousky: “Even if you reform inverse condemnation, utilities cannot pass those costs onto ratepayers unless they get a finding that they’ve acted prudently by the [California Public Utilities Commission].”

August 15, 2018. Burlington County Times. Delaware Valley seeing one of the wettest years in a century. Interview with Carolyn Kousky on the National Flood Insurance Program. Under current rules, nobody except the owner of a property can obtain information on how many times a property has flooded. “Markets can’t operate efficiently if people don’t have that information.”

August 2, 2018. WBUR News. Entrench Or Retreat? That Is the Question On Plum Island. Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: “We’re not thinking strategically in advance of disasters about what the most cost-effective measures are, which communities deserve federal assistance and which don’t.”

July 31, 2018. U.S. News and World Report. How to Fix the National Flood Insurance Program. Interview with Howard Kunreuther: This is a new era of catastrophe. Some of it has to do with climate change, some of it has to do with people moving into hazard prone areas and thinking they are safe. Flood insurance with artificially low premiums can perversely incentivize people to both live in flood-prone areas and underestimate their risk as well as encouraging property owners in high-risk areas to keep rebuilding after flood damage.

July 13, 2018. Knowledge@Wharton. ‘It Won’t Happen to Me’: Why People Don’t Prepare for Disasters. Robert Meyer explains how human brains are wired to forget the trauma that occurs during and after a storm. (Audio)

July 11, 2018. Brink News. Building for Disaster: Stronger Codes for Stronger Cities. Research by Jeffrey Czajkowski and colleagues: “Comparing the increased construction cost to the expected reduction in windstorm damage across the life of the home shows anywhere from $2 to $8 in expected damage reduction—the benefit—for every dollar of increased cost.”

July 9, 2018. Knowledge@Wharton. Is an apology an effective marketing campaign? Wharton professor Robert Meyer notes the ubiquity of apology pleas that corporations are broadcasting for public forgiveness.

June 27, 2018. Penn Today. Facing ‘a new era of catastrophes,’ book by Wharton profs offers tips for business leaders. Wharton’s Howard Kunreuther and Michael Useem’s recent book “Mastering Catastrophic Risk: How Companies are Coping with Disruption” dives into the ways top companies have rebounded after their own worst-case scenarios.

June 18, 2018. Bloomberg. Climate Change May Already Be Hitting the Housing Market. Article quotes Carolyn Kousky: “Some of the riskiest areas have such high amenities.”

June 15, 2018. Knowledge@Wharton. Betting on Disaster: Why Risk Management Is a Leadership Issue. Howard Kunreuther and Michael Useem discuss their new book, “Mastering Catastrophic Risk: How Companies Are Coping with Disruption.”

June 11, 2018. “AM Ocala Live!” (radio, 25 minutes).  Howard Kunreuther and Michael Useem discuss their new book, “Mastering Catastrophic Risk: How Companies Are Coping with Disruption.”

May 25, 2018.Wall Street Journal. After Harvey, Texas Town Looks to Fortify in State With No Mandatory Building Code. Article quotes Jeffrey Czajkowski.

April 17, 2018. American Banker. Small businesses hit by disaster often struggle with credit, too. Article discusses findings from Risk Center research with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. (PDF)

March 29, 2018. WHYY- The Pulse. The Ostrich Paradox: Why We Underprepare for Disasters. Interview (podcast) (3 min.) with Bob Meyer and Howard Kunreuther.

February 7, 2018. New Books Network. The Ostrich Paradox: Why We Underprepare for Disasters (podcast, 55 min. with Robert Meyer and Howard Kunreuther). Leveraging examples of high-impact events, The Ostrich Paradox summarizes how preparedness efforts are affected by issues with human memory, risk probability comprehension, and information overload. Finally, the authors provide a tool for assessing and mitigating these biases through a behavioral risk audit.

January 19, 2018. Knowledge@Wharton. Global Risks in 2018: What Lies Ahead? (podcast and article). Howard Kunreuther and Jeffrey Czajkowski discuss the key takeaways from the 2018 Global Risks Report.

January 11, 2018. The Hill. Americans need better disaster relief and insurance programs. Op-ed by Carolyn Kousky: More than 90 percent of all federal dollars for flood risk reduction are tied to presidential disaster declarations. Making better use of these dollars requires advanced planning.

December 8, 2017, Penn Law. What Congress’ repeal efforts reveal about federal regulatory reform (audio). Professor Cary Coglianese and Gabriel Scheffler highlight findings from their recent study, “What Congress’s Repeal Efforts Can Teach Us About Regulatory Reform.”

December 5, 2017, Knowledge@Wharton. Why Corporate Participation Is Critical for Disaster Relief. This year alone, economic losses from Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria could hit $200 billion. The challenge: Finding ways closely coordinate public and private rescue efforts to put as many resources as possible toward rescue and recovery efforts, Wharton management professors Michael Useem and Tyler Wry, and Luis Ballesteros of The George Washington University (podcast).

October 16, 2017, The Regulatory Review. “Building for Disaster.” Article highlights research on building codes by Jeffrey Czajkowski, Kevin Simmons and James Done.

October 10, 2017, The Wall Street Journal. Small Businesses Say Federal-Disaster Aid Needs Strengthening. Article cites research from the Wharton Risk Center: After superstorm Sandy hit the northeast in 2012, 8% of firms affected by the storm borrowed money from the agency’s disaster-lending program.

October 2017, Enterprise Risk magazine, Institute of Risk Management. Preparing for extreme events. Op-ed by Howard Kunreuther: “A behavioural audit can nudge and encourage individuals to undertake preparedness measures for disasters before they occur.”

September 21, 2017, Penn Current.  Why don’t we better prepare for disasters?  Howard Kunreuther outlines some of biases that lead people to underinvest in protection against low-probability, high-consequence events.  Article cites. “The Ostrich Paradox: Why We Underprepare for Disasters,” by Robert Meyer and Howard Kunreuther.

September 21, 2017, PBS NewsHour. After Harvey and Irma, what’s the future of flood insurance?  (Podcast and transcript) John Miller (Risk Center affiliate, Water Resources Engineer and Master of Environmental Studies Policy Candidate at the University of Pennsylvania) was interviewed on repetitive loss properties along the Passaic River by Paul Solman, Economics Reporter for the PBS NewsHour.

September 16, 2017, The Wall Street Journal.  Homes Built to Stricter Standards Fared Better in Storm.   Cites research involving the Wharton Risk Center that looked at insured-loss data in Florida from 2001 to 2010 and found that the Florida building code reduced windstorm losses by up to 72% and that there were $6 in losses saved for every $1 of additional construction costs.

September 15, 2017, The Hill. Look to Caribbean risk insurance model for US hurricane recovery.” Op-ed by Carolyn Kousky, Director for Policy Research and Engagement at the Wharton Risk Center: “The first few days after a disaster, such as we have recently experienced with Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, are about emergency response: making sure people are safe, reuniting families, securing housing, filling necessities and restoring lifelines. But as days shift to weeks and then months and years, the slow process of rebuilding is undertaken. At every step of the way is the question of financing. Are there dollars available for what needs to be done? Who will pay for it? How will the costs be shared?” Read more

September 15, 2017, Brink News. “Legacy of Harvey and Irma Turns on FEMA’s Post-Disaster Response.” Op-ed by Brett Lingle, Senior Research Coordinator at the Wharton Risk Center: “FEMA spends more on hurricane recovery than on any other type of disaster. Data from OpenFEMA indicates that of the $81.1 billion (nominal dollars) of post-disaster aid the agency has distributed from 2005 to 2016, 70 percent was for hurricane response and recovery. Severe storms and floods accounted for another 25 percent, and all other disasters accounted for just 5 percent.”

September 14, 2017, The Daily Pennsylvanian. After Harvey and Irma, Penn professors explain how cities can better prepare for natural disasters.

September 12, 2017, Penn News. Penn Experts Offer Advice Following Hurricanes Harvey, Irma. Article quotes Howard Kunreuther: “If people hear that there’s a 1-in-100 chance of a flood, they say, ‘I’m not going to worry about it. I’m only going to be in the house for 25 years.’ But over the next 25 years, if you have a 1-in-100 chance of a flood every year, the likelihood of at least one happening to you is 1 in 5. It’s the same probability.”

September 8, 2017, Mother Jones. Here’s Why Florida Is so Much More Vulnerable to a Hurricane Like Irma Right Now. “People generally feel that disasters will not happen to them,” says Howard Kunreuther, the co-director of the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School’s Risk Management and Decision Processes Center.

September 8, 2017, S&P Global. “Lower-income households hurt most by hurricane flooding.” Article quotes Jeffrey Czajkowski, managing director of the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center: “In previous disasters, Houston has had a lot of flood insurance claims that are outside the 100-year floodplain, and I think that will be the case here as well.”

September 6, 2017, Fortune. “How We Can Protect Irma and Harvey Victims From Getting Screwed.” Op-ed by Carolyn Kousky: “As Texas begins the long process of recovery from Hurricane Harvey, and Florida braces for a possible hit from Hurricane Irma, too few victims will have the financial support of insurance payouts.”

September 5, 2017, The New York Times. “Opinion – How Houston’s Growth Created the Perfect Flood Conditions” Article quotes Howard Kunreuther: “It gives people a feeling of complacency if they are not required to buy insurance.”

September 5, 2017, Knowledge@Wharton. “Lessons We Learn from Hurricane Harvey.” (podcast) Wharton’s Howard Kunreuther, Eric Orts and Robert Meyer discuss the fallout from Hurricane Harvey.

August 31, 2017, Brink News. “Flooding and the Economics of Risk Reduction.” Op-ed by Carolyn Kousky: “Moves by the current administration could greatly complicate the process of protecting communities against escalating future losses.”

August 29, 2017, The New York Times. “Homeowners (and Taxpayers) Face Billions in Losses From Harvey Flooding” Article quotes Carolyn Kousky.

August 29, 2017, Business Insider.  “Harvey renews focus on revoked flood risk management standard.”  Article quotes Carolyn Kousky.

August 29, 2017, Business Insider.  “Struggling NFIP staggers under Harvey.”  Article quotes Carolyn Kousky.

August 29, 2017, The Washington Post. “Federal flood insurance program in limbo on Capitol Hill as Harvey’s toll mounts.” Carolyn Kousky of the Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center at the University of Pennsylvania says fundamental tensions between those who want to keep premiums artificially low and those who want a self-sustaining, actuarially sound program are just some of the obstacles to changing it.

August 29, 2017, The Wall Street Journal. https://www.wsj.com/articles/harveys-test-businesses-struggle-with-flawed-insurance-as-floods-multiply-1504022632 “Harvey’s Test: Businesses Struggle With Flawed Insurance as Floods Multiply.” Article quotes Erwann Michel-Kerjan and Ben Collier regarding Risk Center research.

August 28, 2017, Harvard Business Review “How the Insurance Industry Can Push Us to Prepare for Climate Change” In The Ostrich Paradox: Why We Underprepare for Disasters , Robert Meyer and Howard Kunreuther point to several personal traits that expose us to greater risk from natural disasters.

August 25, 2017, Scientific American. “Trump Faces First Big Disaster Test: Hurricane Harvey could be particularly threatening.” Article quotes Robert Meyer: “If you’re just starting to think about it, you’re kind of too late.”

August 18, 2017, Financial Times. “Mental bias leaves us unprepared for disaster.”  Review of The Ostrich Paradox: Why We Underprepare for Disasters by Robert Meyer and Howard Kunreuther.

July 5, 2017, The Hill. How to reform flood insurance to keep more Americans afloat.  Op-ed by Carolyn Kousky explores increased cost of compliance (ICC) of proposed NFIP reform bills.

June 27, 2017, Business Insurance.  House NFIP reform legislation holds promise and pitfalls.   Carolyn Kousky, director for policy research and engagement at the Risk Management and Decision Processes Center at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, comments on proposed legislation that would eliminate the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s ability to offer flood insurance coverage after Jan. 1, 2021, for new structures added in flood hazard zones. “The thought was if you have to pay for private market coverage, which in riskier areas is likely to be more than the NFIP, that you might think harder as a community, as a developer, as a buyer about where you’re locating. Whether that would actually happen, I’m not sure. There’s a lot of pressure in a lot of communities to continue to develop in risky areas.”

June 26, 2017, Journalist’s Resource.  Building codes pay for themselves in disaster-prone regions.   Article highlights research by Kevin Simmons, Jeffrey Czajkowski and James Done.

June 15, 2017, Knowledge@Wharton. “Why Fairness Matters in Reforming Flood and Health Insurance Programs.” By Howard Kunreuther and Mark Pauly.  As Congress looks at restructuring two national insurance plans — the American Health Care Act of 2017, and the National Flood Insurance Program — legislators must address the issue of fairness.

June 13, 2017, Kleinman Center for Energy Policy.  Climate Change and the Future of Risk (podcast). Howard Kunreuther, Co-Director of the Risk Management and Decision Processes Center at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, discusses the challenge of balancing support for communities at risk for natural disaster with the economic and political challenges to doing so. He also highlights how human psychology can make it hard for people to grasp the likelihood of future disasters, and the role this has played in pushing the national flood insurance program to the brink of insolvency.

May 25, 2017, WIRED. Trump’s Budget Forgets that Science is Insurance for America. Article quotes Robert Meyer.

February 10, 2017, VICE News. How Miami’s real estate market is benefitting from rising sea levels.  Interview with Robert Meyer.

News articles and interviews related to the publication of the book, The Ostrich Paradox: Why We Underprepare for Disasters by Robert Meyer and Howard Kunreuther:

June 7, 2016, Psychology Today. Why Disasters Repeat Themselves. Blog post by Robert Meyer and Howard Kunreuther.

May 23, 2017, Wharton Digital Press. Six Reasons We Underprepare for Disasters. By Robert Meyer and Howard Kunreuther.

May 23, 2017,  KQED News. This Scientist’s Doomsday Earthquake Scenarios Will Terrify You, and That’s the Point.  “The challenge really is we are myopic,” says Howard Kunreuther, author of “The Ostrich Paradox: Why We Underprepare for Disasters.” “We focus on the short run and as a result don’t really think about any kind of long-term decisions[…]about how we prepare.”

Spring 2017, Wharton Magazine.  Why You’re Not Prepared For Disasters (And What To Do About It) by Robert Meyer and Howard Kunreuther.

April 6, 2017, Psychology Today. Rising Seas: 4 steps we must take today.  Blog post by Robert Meyer and Howard Kunreuther.

March 30, 2017, Risk and Insurance Network Exchange (RANE). An inconvenient contradiction: why we underprepare for disasters. (podcast)

February 20, 2017, WPR, Wisconsin Public Radio. Why We Underprepare for Disasters, and What We Can Do About It (podcast)

February 12, 2017, Salon.com. Why disasters repeat themselves: We ignore the lessons of the past at our own expense. Op-ed by Howard Kunreuther and Robert Meyer, includes excerpts from the book, The Ostrich Paradox.

February 10, 2017, WWNO, New Orleans Public Radio. “Why Aren’t Humans Better Prepared for Natural Disasters?” (radio interview)

February 10, 2017, New Consciousness Review.  “Why We Underprepare for Disasters”  (radio interview)

February 9, 2017, Psychology Today. “Why We are Underprepared for Disasters”  Op-ed by Robert Meyer and Howard Kunreuther.

February 7, 2017, Knowledge@Wharton. “What Ostriches Can Teach Us about Risk” (video)

February 7, 2017, Think Radio Show (North Texas NPR), “Why We Underprepare for Disasters” (podcast)

February 2, 2017, NY Post. “You’re Wildly Unprepared for a Natural Disaster”

February 2, 2017, Marketplace. “What You’re Doing Wrong to Prepare for Natural Disasters”

January 19, 2017, Knowledge@Wharton. Podcast:  The Biggest Risks Facing the World in 2017.  Howard Kunreuther and Erwann Michel-Kerjan discuss the 2017 Global Risks Report.

January 18, 2017, Scientific American. The Future of Global Risk: A View From Davos.  Op-ed by Erwann Michel-Kerjan. “While not a crystal ball, the report has yielded some startling results.  Only when one monitors risks and maps interdependencies over time, across categories and geographies, can one see changes coming from afar and creatively plan for upcoming disruptions.”

January 18, 2017, This Morning (Seoul Korea). Podcast:  2017 Global Risks Report. Radio interview with Howard Kunreuther on environmental risks highlighted in the 2017 Global Risks Report.

January 13, 2017, Roundhouse Radio (Vancouver, Canada). Radio interview. Erwann Michel-Kerjan discusses the findings and challenges outlined in the 2017 Global Risks Report.

October 28, 2016, Knowledge@Wharton Radio Show, SiriusXM Channel 111,  The Importance of Accurate Flood Maps. (podcast) Howard Kunreuther discusses his research on insurance for catastrophic risk in the wake of Hurricane Matthew.  Background reading for the interview is the Penn-Wharton Public Policy Initiative brief at https://publicpolicy.wharton.upenn.edu/issue-brief/v4n7.php.

August 5, 2016, Tampa Bay Times, Remember the flood insurance scare of 2013?  It’s creeping back into Tampa Bay and Florida.  Article cites research by the Wharton Risk Center showing that Florida has paid in four times more in premiums than it has gotten back in claims payouts from the National Flood Insurance Program.

July 9, 2016, Knowledge@Wharton, Why the Climate Change Debate Has Cooled Off (Podcast and transcript): Howard Kunreuther and Erwann Michel-Kerjan discuss the climate change debate in the presidential election season.

May 13, 2016, Kathmandu Post,  Reconstructing Human Capital.   Op-ed by Risk Center fellow Ajita Atreya: “It is apparent that people opted out of the building regulations and placed themselves in harm’s way.”

April 22, 2016, Marketwatch, To fight climate change, first find some optimism. Op-ed by Prof. Eric W. Orts: “Thinking about the terrible consequences of climate change caused by greenhouse gas emissions of carbon dioxide, methane and other invisible vapors is like thinking about death. Most people prefer not to do it. One common reaction is therefore denial.”

March 25, 2016, The New York Times,  Life Insurance Tries to Lighten Up. Howard Kunreuther notes that a barrier to selling any kind of insurance is that people think of it as an investment rather than a protective measure.

March 16, 2016, Independent Agent magazine, Why City Resilience Matters for Businesses Like Yours.  At a conference hosted by the American Security Project in conjunction with Lloyd’s, Erwann Michel-Kerjan of the Wharton Risk Management Center noted that asset managers could invest in making cities more resilient.

February 19, 2016, The American Prospect magazine, That Sinking Feeling.  Robert Meyer discusses why Miami is experiencing a real estate boom despite rising sea levels.

February 17, 2016, The DP, Lecture on Paris climate change agreement.   The Wharton Risk Center and Penn Program on Regulation hosed a talk by Dale Jamieson (NYU) that focused on the practicalities of enforcing the historic but controversial international agreement worldwide.

February 5, 2016, Knowledge@Wharton, How Risk Management Can Adapt to an Era of ‘Truly Remarkable’ Change. The 10 costliest natural disasters in modern history have occurred since 1985, the year when the Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center was launched by co-director Howard Kunreuther, a professor of operations, information and decisions. In late October, the 30th anniversary of the Center offered a timely opportunity to envision the future of risk management at an all-day conference at Wharton. “Thirty years is a long time in the history of any academic endeavor, but in this field the change has been truly remarkable,” noted University of Pennsylvania Provost Vincent Price, who opened the proceedings. “1985 was pre-Hurricane Andrew, pre-9/11 and pre-Fukushima, to name just a few of the more deadly and costly disasters,” Price said. “1985 was before the Internet and the cell phone — and before we understood the existential danger of climate change.”

January 14, 2016, Penn News, The World Economic Forum and Wharton Release the Global Risk Report 2016: A World at Risk. The World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report 2016, undertaken in conjunction with the Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center of the University of Pennsylvania for the past 11 years, reports opinions of 750 experts who assessed 29 global risks for both impact and likelihood over a 10-year time horizon.  The report is available at https://riskcenter.wharton.upenn.edu/publications/global-risks/

Winter 2016, Environment, Our Hazardous Environment: A Retrospective. Three leaders in the field of hazards management, Baruch Fischhoff, Paul Slovic, and Howard Kunreuther, provide new perspectives on the topic.