The economic impact of school closures during the 2015 flood in Richland County, South Carolina

IF 1.9 Q3 PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

Risk, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy Pub Date : 2022-01-13 DOI:10.1002/rhc3.12242

M. Gall, Tamara L. Sheldon, Larianne Collins

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引用次数: 1

Abstract

Research on the societal costs of disaster-related US school closures has focused, and due to COVID-19 will likely continue to focus, on pandemics, with very limited research on closures from natural hazards. This is surprising given that school closures occur frequently to protect children, teachers, and staff pre-event as well as post-disaster to convert facilities into emergency shelters, etc. This study investigates the secondary effects from post-flooding, temporary school closures after the catastrophic 2015 flash flood in Richland County, South Carolina. Lost productivity from school closures was quantified using the Human Capital Method. Out of the 208 completed surveys, 75% of households had children that missed school. Post-stratifying survey results on race produced an average of $437 in lost productivity due to school closures and an overall $2175 in lost productivity due to flood-related impacts in general. Expressed in FEMA benefit-cost analysis terms, our study shows that schools have a standard value of $215 per household and per day for the unweighted sample ($180 for the race-weighted sample). Furthermore, households' disutility for a late start is almost as great as their disutility for a school closure. These exploratory findings suggest that unplanned school closures should be minimized, and community characteristics carefully considered to avoid unintended socioeconomic consequences.

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2015年南卡罗来纳州里奇兰县洪水期间学校停课的经济影响

关于与灾难相关的美国学校停课的社会成本的研究已经将重点放在流行病上，而且由于新冠肺炎，很可能会继续关注流行病，而对因自然灾害而停课的研究非常有限。这是令人惊讶的，因为学校经常关闭，以在事件发生前和灾后保护儿童、教师和工作人员，将设施改建为紧急避难所等。这项研究调查了2015年南卡罗来纳州里奇兰县灾难性山洪暴发后洪水后学校临时关闭的次要影响。使用人力资本法对学校关闭造成的生产力损失进行了量化。在已完成的208项调查中，75%的家庭有孩子缺课。种族分层后的调查结果显示，由于学校关闭，生产力平均损失437美元，由于洪水相关的影响，生产力总体损失2175美元。用FEMA的福利成本分析术语表示，我们的研究表明，对于未加权样本，学校的标准价值为每户每天215美元（种族加权样本为180美元）。此外，家庭对延迟开学的不利影响几乎与他们对学校关闭的不利影响一样大。这些探索性发现表明，应尽量减少计划外的学校关闭，并仔细考虑社区特征，以避免意外的社会经济后果。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Risk, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION-

CiteScore

7.50

自引率

8.60%

发文量

期刊介绍： Scholarship on risk, hazards, and crises (emergencies, disasters, or public policy/organizational crises) has developed into mature and distinct fields of inquiry. Risk, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy (RHCPP) addresses the governance implications of the important questions raised for the respective fields. The relationships between risk, hazards, and crisis raise fundamental questions with broad social science and policy implications. During unstable situations of acute or chronic danger and substantial uncertainty (i.e. a crisis), important and deeply rooted societal institutions, norms, and values come into play. The purpose of RHCPP is to provide a forum for research and commentary that examines societies’ understanding of and measures to address risk,hazards, and crises, how public policies do and should address these concerns, and to what effect. The journal is explicitly designed to encourage a broad range of perspectives by integrating work from a variety of disciplines. The journal will look at social science theory and policy design across the spectrum of risks and crises — including natural and technological hazards, public health crises, terrorism, and societal and environmental disasters. Papers will analyze the ways societies deal with both unpredictable and predictable events as public policy questions, which include topics such as crisis governance, loss and liability, emergency response, agenda setting, and the social and cultural contexts in which hazards, risks and crises are perceived and defined. Risk, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy invites dialogue and is open to new approaches. We seek scholarly work that combines academic quality with practical relevance. We especially welcome authors writing on the governance of risk and crises to submit their manuscripts.