IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/25427.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Estimating the peace dividend: the impact of violence on house prices in Northern Ireland

Author

Listed:
  • Besley, Timothy
  • Mueller, Hannes

Abstract

This paper exploits data on the pattern of violence across regions and over time to estimate the impact of the peace process in Northern Ireland on house prices. We begin with a linear model that estimates the average treatment effect of a conflictrelated killing on house prices - showing a negative correlation between house prices and killings. We then develop an approach based on an economic model where the parameters of the statistical process are estimated for a Markov switching model where conflict and peace are treated as a latent state. From this, we are able to construct a measure of the discounted number of killings which is updated in the light of actual killings. This model naturally suggests a heterogeneous effect of killings across space and time which we use to generate estimates of the peace dividend. The economic model suggests a somewhat different pattern of estimates to the linear model. We also show that there is some evidence of spillover effects of violence in adjacent regions.

Suggested Citation

  • Besley, Timothy & Mueller, Hannes, 2009. "Estimating the peace dividend: the impact of violence on house prices in Northern Ireland," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 25427, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:25427
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/25427/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. José G. Montalvo & Marta Reynal-Querol, 2005. "Ethnic Polarization, Potential Conflict, and Civil Wars," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(3), pages 796-816, June.
    2. Asaf Zussman & Noam Zussman, 2006. "Assassinations: Evaluating the Effectiveness of an Israeli Counterterrorism Policy Using Stock Market Data," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 20(2), pages 193-206, Spring.
    3. Sandra E. Black, 1999. "Do Better Schools Matter? Parental Valuation of Elementary Education," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(2), pages 577-599.
    4. Massimo Guidolin & Eliana La Ferrara, 2007. "Diamonds Are Forever, Wars Are Not: Is Conflict Bad for Private Firms?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(5), pages 1978-1993, December.
    5. Bruno S. Frey & Simon Luechinger & Alois Stutzer, "undated". "Valuing Public Goods: The Life Satisfaction Approach," IEW - Working Papers 184, Institute for Empirical Research in Economics - University of Zurich.
    6. Alberto Abadie & Javier Gardeazabal, 2003. "The Economic Costs of Conflict: A Case Study of the Basque Country," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 113-132, March.
    7. Coyne, Christopher J. & Dempster, Gregory M. & Isaacs, Justin P., 2010. "Asset values and the sustainability of peace prospects," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 146-156, May.
    8. Hamilton, James D, 1989. "A New Approach to the Economic Analysis of Nonstationary Time Series and the Business Cycle," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(2), pages 357-384, March.
    9. Collins, William J. & Margo, Robert A., 2007. "The Economic Aftermath of the 1960s Riots in American Cities: Evidence from Property Values," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 67(4), pages 849-883, December.
    10. John F. Kain & John M. Quigley, 1975. "Housing Markets and Racial Discrimination: A Microeconomic Analysis," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number kain75-1.
    11. Quigley, John M. & Rosenthal, Larry A., 2005. "The Effects of Land-Use Regulation on the Price of Housing: What Do We Know? What Can We Learn?," Berkeley Program on Housing and Urban Policy, Working Paper Series qt90m9g90w, Berkeley Program on Housing and Urban Policy.
    12. Abadie, Alberto & Dermisi, Sofia, 2008. "Is terrorism eroding agglomeration economies in Central Business Districts? Lessons from the office real estate market in downtown Chicago," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 451-463, September.
    13. Steve Gibbons, 2004. "The Costs of Urban Property Crime," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 114(499), pages 441-463, November.
    14. Hamilton, James D., 1990. "Analysis of time series subject to changes in regime," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 45(1-2), pages 39-70.
    15. S. Brock Blomberg & Gregory D. Hess, 2002. "The Temporal Links between Conflict and Economic Activity," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 46(1), pages 74-90, February.
    16. Asaf Zussman & Noam Zussman & Morten Ørregaard Nielsen, 2008. "Asset Market Perspectives on the Israeli–Palestinian Conflict," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 75(297), pages 84-115, February.
    17. Bruno Frey & Simon Luechinger & Alois Stutzer, 2009. "The life satisfaction approach to valuing public goods: The case of terrorism," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 138(3), pages 317-345, March.
    18. Willard, Kristen L & Guinnane, Timothy W & Rosen, Harvey S, 1996. "Turning Points in the Civil War: Views from the Greenback Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(4), pages 1001-1018, September.
    19. Leigh Linden & Jonah E. Rockoff, 2008. "Estimates of the Impact of Crime Risk on Property Values from Megan's Laws," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(3), pages 1103-1127, June.
    20. Lucas W. Davis, 2004. "The Effect of Health Risk on Housing Values: Evidence from a Cancer Cluster," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(5), pages 1693-1704, December.
    21. José Garcia Montalvo & Marta Reynal-Querol, 2004. "Ethnic polarization, potential conflict and civil wars," Economics Working Papers 770, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, revised Mar 2005.
    22. Katherine Kiel & Melissa Boyle, 2001. "A Survey of House Price Hedonic Studies of the Impact of Environmental Externalities," Working Papers 0111, College of the Holy Cross, Department of Economics.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Elster, Yael & Zussman, Asaf & Zussman, Noam, 2017. "Rockets: The housing market effects of a credible terrorist threat," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 136-147.
    2. Nowak, Adam & Sayago-Gomez, Juan, 2018. "Homeowner preferences after September 11th, a microdata approach," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 330-351.
    3. William F. Shughart, 2011. "Terrorism in Rational Choice Perspective," Chapters, in: Christopher J. Coyne & Rachel L. Mathers (ed.), The Handbook on the Political Economy of War, chapter 8, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    4. Friedrich Schneider & Tilman Brück & Daniel Meierrieks, 2010. "The Economics of Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism: A Survey (Part II)," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1050, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    5. Timothy Besley & Torsten Persson, 2011. "Pillars of Prosperity: The Political Economics of Development Clusters," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 9624.
    6. Muñoz-Morales, Juan & Singh, Ruchi, 2023. "Do school shootings erode property values?," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
    7. Marc Rockmore, 2017. "The Cost of Fear: The Welfare Effect of the Risk of Violence in Northern Uganda," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 31(3), pages 650-669.
    8. Ezcurra, Roberto & Palacios, David, 2016. "Terrorism and spatial disparities: Does interregional inequality matter?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 60-74.
    9. Patrick Gourley, 2019. "Social Stigma and Asset Value," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 85(3), pages 919-938, January.
    10. Nadav Ben Itzhak, 2018. "The Effect of Terrorism on Housing Rental Prices: Evidence from Jerusalem," Bank of Israel Working Papers 2018.08, Bank of Israel.
    11. Steve Gibbons & Stephan Heblich & Esther Lho & Christopher Timmins, 2016. "Fear of Fracking? The Impact of the Shale Gas Exploration on House Prices in Britain," SERC Discussion Papers 0207, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    12. Woei-Chyuan Wong & Adilah Azhari & Nur Adiana Hiau Abdullah & Chee Yin Yip, 2019. "Estimating the impact of crime risk on housing prices in Malaysia," International Journal of Housing Markets and Analysis, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 13(5), pages 769-789, November.
    13. Jérôme Adda & Brendon McConnell & Imran Rasul, 2014. "Crime and the Depenalization of Cannabis Possession: Evidence from a Policing Experiment," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 122(5), pages 1130-1202.
    14. Congdon-Hohman, Joshua M., 2013. "The lasting effects of crime: The relationship of discovered methamphetamine laboratories and home values," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 31-41.
    15. Bishop, Kelly C. & Timmins, Christopher, 2019. "Estimating the marginal willingness to pay function without instrumental variables," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 66-83.
    16. Shoham Amir & Rosenboim Mosi & Malul Miki & Saadon Yossi, 2011. "Core and Periphery -- The Dual Effect of Terror," Peace Economics, Peace Science, and Public Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 17(1), pages 1-15, September.
    17. He, Yinghua & Nielsson, Ulf & Wang, Yonglei, 2017. "Hurting without hitting: The economic cost of political tension," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 106-124.
    18. Mattheus Brenig & Till Proeger, 2018. "Putting a Price Tag on Security: Subjective Well-Being and Willingness-to-Pay for Crime Reduction in Europe," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 145-166, January.
    19. Hua, Nan & Yang, Yang, 2017. "Systematic effects of crime on hotel operating performance," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 257-269.
    20. Brenig, Mattheus & Proeger, Till, 2016. "Putting a price tag on security: Subjective well-being and willingness-to-pay for crime reduction in Europe," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 278, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D74 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Conflict; Conflict Resolution; Alliances; Revolutions
    • O16 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Financial Markets; Saving and Capital Investment; Corporate Finance and Governance
    • P16 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Capitalist Economies - - - Capitalist Institutions; Welfare State

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:25427. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.