Economists
often rely on publicly available data provided at coarse geographical
resolution to value spatially localized amenities. We propose a simple
refinement to the hedonic method that accommodates this reality:
specifically, we measure localized benefits from the cleanup of
hazardous waste sites at the sub-census tract level by examining the entire within-tract housing value distribution,
rather than simply focusing on the tract median. Our point estimates
indicate that the cleanup leads to larger appreciation in house prices
at the lower percentiles of the within-tract house value distribution
than at higher percentiles. Though not statistically different from one
another, the estimates are monotonically ordered from 24.4% at the 10th
percentile, 20.8% at the median and 18.7% at the 90th percentile,
respectively. We confirm these results in two ways. First, our analysis
using restricted access census block data finds comparable results that
cleanup leads to a 14.7% appreciation in the median block-level housing
values. Second, our analysis of proprietary housing transactions data
show that cheaper houses within a census tract are indeed more likely to
be closer to a hazardous waste site, explaining the greater impacts
they receive from the cleanup process.
- Fig. 5. Distribution of net benefits from Superfund cleanup at each of the 52 sites and combined sites that have been deleted from the NPL
- by Shanti Gamper-Rabindrana,
and Christopher Timminsb,
- a Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, University of Pittsburgh, USA
- b Department of Economics, Duke University, USA
- Journal of Environmental Economics and Management via Elsevier Science Direct www.ScienceDirect.com
- In Press available online 22 December 2012
- Keywords: Hedonic property method; Localized public goods; Heterogeneous treatment effects; Hazardous waste remediation
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