Expensive Tastes and Living in High-Risk or Hazardous Areas: Claims to Compensation

Abstract

In this paper, I defend a position contrary to a popular view of distributive justice. Residents of flood-prone or otherwise hazardous areas, like the Gulf South of the United States, receive substantial amounts of aid, paid through taxes on people living elsewhere in the US, after natural disasters that frequent the region. In popular discourse, some argue that we have reason not to (re)build in high-risk or hazardous areas, like the Gulf South. Instead, these residents, and others in similarly situated regions, should “relocate.” If residents choose to stay, then the government and taxpayers do not owe them financial compensation to rebuild. Against that view, I argue that egalitarians commit to compensating many such people. However, I propose broadening our understanding of ‘compensation’ and going forward, focus on agency-enhancing efforts as compensation instead of solely relying on standard post-disaster financial compensation, as current policies generally do. Later in the paper, I offer a metric and tiered system that proposes alternatives to the standard compensation and claim that agency-enhancing compensation aligns with the egalitarian’s commitment to compensate individuals following a natural disaster. I conclude that a tiered system and a broader compensation approach provides egalitarians with more options than the current standard compensation allows.

KEYWORDS:

• environmental ethics
• public policy
• distributive Justice
• natural disasters
• compensation

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Hurdle’s (2022) ‘As Climate Fears Mount, Some in U.S. are Deciding to Relocate’,Tompkins’s (2022) ‘Should we rebuild in hurricane-prone areas?’, Harvey Molotch’s (2013) ‘Why Residents of Disaster-Prone Areas Don’t Move’, Franklin’s (2022) ‘Some don’t evacuate, despite repeated hurricane warnings, because they can’t’ Florido’s (2018) “Why Stay During A Hurricane? Because It’s Not As Simple As ‘Get Out’ “Chloe Reichel’s (2018) ‘Why people choose to stay in areas vulnerable to natural disasters’ Isaacs-Thomas’s (2021) ‘Extreme Weather doesn’t usually motivate Americans to move. Here’s why’.

2. Agency-enhancing compensation will be discussed in Section 4 in more depth.

3. See, Danny Shahar’s (2021) “Harm, Responsibility, and the Far-off Impacts of Climate Change, “Shue’s (2015), Harm Prohibition, and Preservation Requirement: Core Practical Convergence on Climate Change’, and Jensen and Bech Flanagan’s (2013), ‘Climate Change and Compensation’.

4. Fault, here, is being used to maintain continuity with Cohen’s account and does not contain any moral implications of ‘bad’.

5. See Dworkin (1981, p. 293) and Lippert-Rasmussen (2015) for a further discussion on brute and option luck.

6. See Raymond Burby’s (2006) discussion on the safe development and local government paradox in his article, ‘Hurricane Katrina and the Paradoxes of Government Disaster Policy: Bringing About Wise Governmental Decisions for Hazardous Areas’.

7. In contrast to new transplants(e.g. college or university students) a seasoned transplant is an individual who has resided and established roots in the area for an extended amount of time.

8. In this context, ‘native Louisianan or New Orleanian’ broadly includes individuals indigenous to the Mississippi Delta and those who have lived in the area for most or all of their lifetimes.

9. For example, they may not know how to ask landlords if their windows are hurricane proof, understand disaster aid eligibility, seek elevated housing, know their renters’ rights for that area, and other local risk mitigation measures.

10. While they may receive some recommendations and information from their university, work, or colleagues, they may still lack access to comprehensive information and be unfamiliar with where to go to access it.