Carolyn Kousky | Island Press Author

Carolyn Kousky

Carolyn Kousky is Associate Vice President for Economics and Policy at the Environmental Defense Fund. Prior to joining EDF, she was the Executive Director at the Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center at the University of Pennsylvania, where she founded and directed the Policy Incubator. Dr. Kousky’s research examines multiple aspects of disaster insurance markets, disaster finance, climate risk management, and policy approaches for increasing resilience. She has published numerous articles, reports, and book chapters on the economics and policy of climate risk and disaster insurance markets, and is routinely cited in media outlets including NPR, The New York Times, and The Financial Times, among many others. She is the recipient of the 2013 Tartufari International Prize from the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei. She is the vice-chair of the California Climate Insurance Working Group, a university fellow at Resources for the Future, a non-resident scholar at the Insurance Information Institute, and a member of the Roundtable on Risk and Resilience of Extreme Events at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. She has a BS in Earth Systems from Stanford University and a PhD in Public Policy from Harvard University.

Understanding Disaster Insurance by Carolyn Kousky | An Island Press book

Understanding Disaster Insurance

New Tools for a More Resilient Future

The frequency and intensity of natural disasters—such as wildfires, hurricanes, floods, and storms—is on the rise, threatening our way of life and our livelihoods. Managing this growing risk will be central to economic and social progress in the coming decades. Insurance, an often confusing and unpopular tool, will be critical to successfully emerging from the effects of these crises. Its traditional role is to protect us from unforeseen and unanticipated risk, but as currently structured, insurance cannot adequately respond to these types of threats.