Essays in urban and environmental economics

This thesis comprises four independent chapters at the intersection of urban, environmental, and development economics. The first chapter presents novel evidence on how temperature fluctuations affect wealth inequality in both rural and urban settings. The second investigates how land scarcity drives urban expansion into high flood risk zones. The third evaluates the impact of flood defence investments on local population growth, leveraging a unique institutional setting in Vietnam. The final chapter analyzes the local economic effects of relocating economic activity across space using the BBC’s move from London to Manchester as a natural experiment.