In a war zone, whether you stay or flee depends on how much you value the future—but only if the danger is 'moderate.'
April 16, 2026
Original Paper
Risk Preferences and the Willingness to Relocate to Danger: Evidence from Wartime Ukraine
SSRN · 6566867
The Takeaway
We assume 'risk aversion' (how much you hate danger) is the only reason people flee wars. But in Ukraine, researchers found something weird: in high-danger cities like Kharkiv, everyone’s survival instinct takes over. But in 'moderate' danger areas like Kyiv, people treat the decision to stay or go like a standard economic trade-off. In those cases, the biggest factor isn't fear, but how much you value future rewards versus your present situation. This means in moderate danger, people are making calm, cold calculations about their future wealth, making traditional 'safety' incentives surprisingly ineffective.
From the abstract
We elicit reservation wage premia for relocating to two Ukrainian cities, using a household survey conducted in mid-April to mid-July 2024 during the Russian invasion of Ukraine: high-risk Kharkiv (near the frontline) and moderate-risk Kyiv. Risk tolerance is a strong predictor of willingness to move to Kharkiv—the most risk-averse have roughly half the odds of the most risk-tolerant—but matters much less for Kyiv. This asymmetry is difficult to reconcile with the hypothesis that risk tolerance