Studying the Effect of Natural Disasters on Economic Activity

Multiple economic publications have established night-time luminosity as a valid proxy for economic activity. Building on these results, we use night-time satellite imagery with institutional natural disaster records to study the connection between such disasters and economic activity. We attempt to model light intensity over time and find the multiple effects of catastrophe events on economy and infrastructure. In order to achieve these goals, we also plan to build the technical infrastructure for working efficiently with this specific dataset.