The Declining Use of Unskilled Labour in Italian Manufacturing: Is Trade to Blame? CEPS Working Document No. 178, December 2001

As in other industrialised countries, the manufacturing sector in Italy has recently experienced a substantial increase in the use of skilled relative to unskilled workers - skill upgrading. In this paper we estimate a model, based upon the notion of outsourcing, of the relative demand for skilled labour which allows identification of the roles of technological change and trade, the two main culprits, in skill upgrading. Compared to previous studies of Italy the model is applied to highly disaggregated industrial data and in addition the impact of trade is more precisely measured through the separate identification of import flows from low-wage labour abundant countries and those from OECD partners. Furthermore we also introduce a measure of trade variability. Our results show firstly that economic variables played little or no role in determining the relative demand for unskilled workers in the 1970s in Italy, reflecting the nature of Italian labour market institutions in the period. Subsequently, in the 1980s and 1990s, following some labour market reforms, we find that international competition, in terms of import penetration and the variability of trade prices, had a significant effect on the relative demand for blue-collar workers in Italy in skilled intensive sectors. In unskilled intensive sectors, such as textiles and clothing, where the impact of imports from low-wage countries might be expected to be more pronounced, we do not find a significant effect from imports but rather that the most important role has been played by technological change. The result is consistent with previous studies that indicate that Italian textile and clothing firms have remained internationally competitive by increasingly switching to high quality segments of the industry

Urban heritage and cultural tourism development : a case study of Valletta’s role in Malta’s tourism

Despite significant potential for cultural tourism, the predominant form of tourism in Malta is sun and sea. This paper evaluates Malta’s potential for cultural tourism with a focus on Valletta, a fortified historic city that overlooks the Grand Harbour. Valletta’s rich urban heritage and historic narrative makes it ideal for the development of a more culture-oriented tourism. The paper explores how, over more than half a century of tourism activity in Malta, culture and heritage retained a secondary role. Since the mid-nineties, Malta’s tourism policy shifted with culture and heritage being given greater importance, even if the sun and sea tourism remained a priority. Public and private investment brought about changes in Valletta that made it more amenable to cultural activity and tourism. Although European Capital of Culture Valletta 2018 provides new opportunities for cultural tourism to Malta, it is unclear whether this will bring a lasting legacy for Malta’s tourism. This Valletta case study shows that, for destinations with an established form of tourism, the development of cultural tourism meets with difficulties, in spite the presence of a rich urban heritage.peer-reviewe

Barriers to the Employment and Work-Place Advancement of Latinos

Glass Ceiling ReportGlassCeilingBackground10Latinos.pdf: 7771 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

Essays on Human Capital Accumulation and Inequality.

This thesis is composed by four independent chapters. Their common denominator is the process of human capital accumulation analyzed under different perspectives and using different techniques. In the following I will shortly describe each chapter in more detail. Chapter 1 addresses an important aspect of the effects of trade liberalization that has gained much attention in recent years: raising skill premia. It is motivated by recent evidence showing that trade liberalization in developing countries is often associated with a large increase in wage inequality. I investigate the mechanism through which a trade related increase in the demand for skilled labor affects human capital investment and the wealth distribution of a developing country economy. In particular I focus on a scenario where the liberalizing economy is in a poverty trap. This is because developing economies are often plagued by credit market imperfections. Imperfect financial markets raise the probability that individuals are constrained in their human capital investment decisions and that the economy is a poverty trap. I use a standard overlapping generation model to show how a trade related increase in the demand for skilled labor can release a developing country from a poverty trap, leading to increased human capital accumulation and technology progress. The skill biased technological shock benefits the whole economy and "trickles down" - through the interest rate - to unskilled workers a la Aghion & Bolton (1997). Chapter 2, which is joint work with Lidia Farre, analyzes the educational choices of Argentinean teenagers during different phases of the economic cycle. We use data for Argentinean households over the period 1995-2002 to examine households' response to negative idiosyncratic income shocks in different macroeconomic scenarios. We study how teenagers' school progress responds to household head unemployment during periods of high economic growth and compare it to the response during recession years, when families are more likely to be financially constrained. After accounting for the potential endogeneity of household head unemployment we find that school failure in response to unemployment shocks increases during periods of economic instability. Further we find that for first born boys this results from a greater involvement in labor market activities. Our results add to the existing literature on the long term cost of macroeconomic crises. In Chapter 3 I analyze a different aspect of the Argentinean macroeconomic crisis and the related social costs. Argentina experienced an important increase of informal employment and wage dispersion in the last 20 years. This chapter extends a search model with exogenous human capital accumulation to include an informal sector. The model is parametrized such to fit Argentinean data in order to investigate the effect of employment protection measures on informality, employment and wage dispersion under two different macroeconomic conditions. I find that for low educated workers both severance pay and minimum wages increase informality. In the presence of vii a wage floor severance payments do not affect employment but only shift marginal workers from the covered sector to the unregulated one. I find that a decrease in the return to human capital skills increases the incentives to seek informal employment. Labor market protection measures and declining human capital return are able to explain most of the increase in informality and much of the increase in wage dispersion. Last chapter is coauthored with Christian Dustmann and focuses on the very early phases of human capital investment: pre school years. In this chapter we investigate test score gaps and their evolution for white and ethnic minority children aged 3 and 5 in the UK. We also analyse the effect of early school exposure on test score gaps, and differences in the effect of entry age on early school performance. Ethnic test score gaps at age 3 - when most children are not enrolled in Kindergarten yet - are large. Background characteristics (in particular exposure to the English language) explain part, but not all of this differential. Between the age of 3 and 5, the ethnic test score gap narrows. Exposure to preschool measured at age 5 - even if limited to only a few months - has a larger positive effects on test scores for those minority groups who started from a more disadvantaged position. Further, keeping exposure to pre-school constant, ethnic minority children loose less from entering pre-school at a younger age than majority individuals; for some groups, there is an overall gain from entering school early. Our findings point at a reduction in achievement gaps between minority and majority children in the UK between age 3 and age 5, which is partly due to a larger positive effect of pre-school on achievements of minorities.Human capital; Economic development;

Occupational training among Peruvian men : does it make a difference?

This report presents the first evaluation of the outcomes of the Peruvian training sector since its outset in the 1960s. The paper examines the private returns to post-school training among male (wage and non-farm self-employed) workers in the urban areas of Peru. In particular, the study focuses on two issues: first, who are the recipients of post-school training, and what are the determinants of participation in post-school training? Second, what is the impact of job-training on the wages of employees and self-employed workers? In general, the results of the study imply that investments in training have significant benefits vis a vis formal schooling, when related to wage employment in the private sector of the economy. However, since no information is available in the"costs"of the post-school training investments examined, the results should not be regarded as a complete evaluation of the economic benefits of training in Peru.ICT Policy and Strategies,Poverty Impact Evaluation,Teaching and Learning,Tertiary Education,Labor Standards

FREE ADMISSION TO MUSEUMS AND MONUMENTS: AN EXPLORATION OF SOME PERCEPTIONS OF THE AUDIENCES.

This paper considers the theme of the audiences' perceptions of free admission in national French museums and monuments. The results show that, from an individual perspective, perceptions of free admission are linked to perceptions of price, of money and of payment, hence complementing perceptions expressed in a collective perspective (a symbolic, political measure, causing either adhesion or rejection). These perspectives are generally put forward by both advocates and opponents of the measure in their discussions. This different vision of free admission has managerial implications for managers of museums and monuments.Free admission, price, museums and monuments, multiangulation

Understanding Occupational and Skill Demand in New Jersey's Construction Industry

The construction industry is integral to New Jersey's economy, employing over 160,000 people. Nationally and in New Jersey, the construction industry is thriving, injecting billions of dollars into the state. Jobs in the industry are changing with an influx of new technology and new building materials, requiring that workers have more technical expertise than in the past. This report summarizes the skill, knowledge, and educational requirements of key construction occupations and identifies strategies for meeting the key workforce challenges facing the industry