The comparative advantage of countries evolves over time, yet firms do not continuously adapt their production structure to this evolution. This slow adaptation may be due to high adjustment costs, such as those associated with the disposal of existing physical capital. In practice, these costs...

This paper examines the response of firms to capital destruction. Using Indian firm data we establish that tropical storms destroy up to 43% of firms' capital. We use this exogenous shock to capital and find that within industry less productive firms suffer disproportionately more, both along...

This paper examines the response of firms to capital destruction, using a new measure of firm exposure to tropical storms as a negative exogenous shock on firms' capital stock. Drawing on a panel of Indian manufacturing firms between 1995 and 2006, we establish that, depending on their strength,...