Destruction from Typhoon Haiyan, which flattened buildings and unleashed storm surges that may have killed 10,000 people, could be several times worse for the Philippines economy than superstorm Sandy was for the U.S.
Losses will be $12 billion to $15 billion, or about 5 percent of economic output in the island nation, according to an estimate by Charles Watson, director of research and development at Kinetic Analysis Corp., a disaster-modeling firm. Sandy, which struck the U.S. last year and flooded parts of New York and New Jersey, caused damage that was less than 1 percent of gross domestic product in the world’s largest economy, he said.
