Buildings in areas with high economic development levels have strong earthquake resistance, and the mortality rate caused by earthquakes is low. From 1990 to 2015, a total of 387 earthquakes (excluding the earthquakes that caused the tsunami) occurred in Asia. The paper took Asian countries as an example to quantitatively estimate the impact of economic development on the mortality of earthquakes. Based on spatial statistics and regression analysis, the paper obtained the mortality rate of every historical earthquake and drew the magnitude-mortality rate curves for three groups at different economic levels, namely, Group I (per capita GDP range of $12,500-$45,000), Group II (per capita GDP range of $1,700-$12,500), and Group III (per capita GDP range of $550-$1,700). With a M 6 earthquake, the mortality rate of Group I, II and III was 0.0002‰, 0.0071‰ and 0.0871‰ respectively. However, due to the powerful destructiveness of giant earthquakes, as the magnitude of the earthquakes increases, the differences among the three groups decrease. Furthermore, if the economic development of Asian countries maintains its pace of the past 20 years, the vulnerability of Groups II and III will reach the current level of Group I in the year of 2046. Then if earthquakes that have occurred in the past occur again, the death toll will be reduced from 399,509 to 107,112. In general, as the GDP per capita doubles, the earthquake mortality rate will drop by 19%–25%, and the disaster-reduction goals proposed by the Sendai Framework can be achieved.

经济发展水平较高地区的建筑抗震能力强，地震致死率低。1990年至2015年，亚洲共发生地震387次（不包括引发海啸的地震）。论文以亚洲国家为例，定量估计了经济发展对地震死亡率的影响。本文基于空间统计和回归分析，获得了历史地震的死亡率，并绘制了不同经济水平下三组的震级-死亡率曲线，即第一组（人均GDP范围为$12,500-$45,000）、组II（人均 GDP 范围为 1,700-12,500 美元）和第三组（人均 GDP 范围为 550-1,700 美元）。用一个M6级地震，Ⅰ、Ⅱ、Ⅲ组死亡率分别为0.0002‰、0.0071‰和0.0871‰。但是，由于特大地震的破坏性很强，随着震级的增加，三组之间的差异逐渐减小。再者，如果亚洲国家的经济发展保持过去20年的速度，2046年第二组和第三组的脆弱性将达到目前第一组的水平。那么如果过去发生的地震再次发生，死亡人数将从 399,509 人减少到 107,112 人。总的来说，随着人均GDP翻一番，地震死亡率将下降19%~25%，仙台框架提出的减灾目标可以实现。