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This paper examines the provision of official flood risk information
in the United States and its distributional impacts on residential
flood insurance take-up. Assembling all flood maps produced after
Hurricane Katrina, I document that updated maps decreased the
number of properties zoned in high-risk floodplains and incorrectly
omitted five million properties, primarily in neighborhoods with
more Black and Hispanic residents. Leveraging the staggered timing
of map updates, I estimate that updated maps decreased flood
insurance take-up and exacerbated racial disparities in insurance
coverage. While past map updates distorted risk and price signals,
correcting flood maps would yield substantial welfare gains.
