Private Hochwasservorsorge und Elementarschadenversicherung: Moral Hazard, der Effekt von Informationskampagnen, und eine Versicherungsillusion

In light of increasing flood damage, private flood mitigation gains more relevance. We inves-tigate empirically whether the uptake of private flood mitigation measures in Germany is af-fected by (a) the perceived flood insurance coverage, and (b) public information campaigns focussing on flood hazards. We use a novel longitudinal dataset of more than 3,200 house-holds and employ a difference-in-differences estimation approach. The results show that households who state a change in their insurance status and report themselves as being insured mitigate more, not less. This contradicts the expectation of moral hazard and suggests that insurance and mitigation are rather seen as complements than substitutes. Moreover, the survey data suggest that many households falsely expect being flood-insured. Public infor-mation campaigns show no measurable effect on the flood mitigation behaviour of house-holds, which poses questions about the effectiveness of large-scale information campaigns. In tendency, our results support the idea of compulsory flood insurance.

Osberghaus, Daniel and Alina Philippi (2016), Private Hochwasservorsorge und Elementarschadenversicherung: Moral Hazard, der Effekt von Informationskampagnen, und eine Versicherungsillusion, Zeitschrift für die gesamte Versicherungswissenschaft 105(3) , 289-306