Foreign Ownership and Productivity: is the Direction of Causality so Obvious?

multinational firms, total factor productivity, panel data

Does ICT Investment Spur or Hamper Offshoring? Empirical Evidence from Microdata

In this paper we provide empirical evidence on the effect of ICT investment on the propensity to offshore for a large sample of Italian manufacturing firms. Contrary to previous literature focusing on the service sector, after taking into account the endogeneity of ICT investment in the offshoring decision equation we find a negative and significant effect of ICT on the propensity to offshore some stages of the production process. Furthermore this effect turns out not to depend on the type of ICT investment and applies both to hardware and software/telecommunication expenditures. A potential explanation for our finding is that ICT investments in manufacturing increase the complementarity of production processes within the firm, thereby reducing the incentive to offshore. Our results seem therefore to suggest that negative exogenous shocks to ICT prices–possibly induced by targeted policy programs aimed at the diffusion of ICT technologies–do not favor offshoring of manufacturing activities.ICT Investment, Offshoring, Maximum Likelihood System Estimation

Attracting Foreign Investments in Europe - are Italian Regions Doomed?

Foreign direct investments in Europe have grown substantially over the last decade, but Italian regions account for a very small portion of such increase. Why does Italian regions attract such a low number of foreign investors? Is it a regional or a country problem? One explanation for this pattern could be that the characteristics of Italian regions are not attractive to foreign multinationals. A different, although not alternative, explanation is that Italian regions may be ‘doomed’ by the fact that they all share common national policies and institutions (such as, tax regimes, efficiency of bureaucracy, degree of labour market regulation and effectiveness of the legal and property right protection system) which discourage foreign firms to locate their plants in Italy. This view follows a tradition of cross-country studies which have addressed the role of institutional and policy characteristics as determinants of inward FDIs. In this paper we will model the potential attractiveness of 52 NUTS1 regions in 5 EU countries in terms of their main observable characteristics and will investigate whether Italian regions attract more or less than their potential. In other words, we will ask whether a EU region with the same characteristics of an Italian region will attract a different amount of FDIs. Second, we will evaluate the impact of some national policy and institutional characteristics on the attractiveness of regions and we will assess the role of such factors in explaining the Italian specificity. Third, we will simulate the relative contribution to FDIs in Italian regions of regional and national variables. This exercise will help us assessing to what extent the low attractiveness of Italian regions is the result of specific regional characteristics or of countrywide factors.

Location Determinants of Greenfield Foreign Investments in the Enlarged Europe: Evidence from a Spatial Autoregressive Negative Binomial Additive Model

This paper addresses two important methodological issues in the analysis of industrial location: spatial dependence and nonlinearities. To this end, we estimate a semi-parametric spatial autoregressive negative binomial model using data on the number of inward greenfield FDI occurred over the 2003-2007 period in 249 European regions. Results support the view that multinational firms’ location choices are very spatially dependent, even controlling for a large number of regional characteristics. A spatial lag model with a non-parametric spatial filter allows us to purge the residuals from spatial dependence and yields sensible changes in the magnitude of some estimated coefficients. We also provide robust evidence of nonlinearities. In particular, we find that the effect of agglomeration economies fades down as the density of economic activities reaches some limit value.Multinational firms, greenfield FDI, count data, spatial econometrics, semiparametric econometrics

Spatial clustering and nonlinearities in the location of multinational firms

We propose a semiparametric geoadditive negative binomial model of industrial location which allows to simultaneously address some important methodological issues, such as spatial clustering and nonlinearities, which have been only partly addressed in previous studies. We apply this model to analyze location determinants of inward greenfield investments occurred over the 2003-2007 period in 249 European regions. The inclusion of a geoadditive component (a smooth spatial trend surface) allows to control for omitted variables which induce spatial clustering, and suggests that such unobserved factors may be related to regional policies towards foreign investors Allowing for nonlinearities reveals, in line with theoretical predictions, that the positive effect of agglomeration economies fades as the density of economic activities reaches some limit value.industrial location, negative binomial models, geoadditive models, european union.

Effects of mergers and acquisitions: a critical survey of the empirical evidence

The aim of this paper is to review the "state of the art" of empirical analysis on the subject of the effects of mergers and acquisitions. After a brief introduction I will present the conflicting evidence outlined, up to the mid eighties, by the Industrial Organization stream of analysis and the Financial Economics one; afterwards, the most important contributions emerged since then, innovative in terms of amount and type of data used and in terms of more accurate methodologies, will be presented. Finally, special attention will be devoted to the still scattered empirical evidence for Italy.

On the Limit Behaviour of Moment Resisting Connections Under Uncertainties

Moment resisting connections are mainly designed to transfer bending moments and shear forces. Generally speaking, the design strength of a moment resisting connection can be classified as full-strength (moment capacity of the connection equal to or greater than that of the connected member) or partial-strength (the moment capacity of the connection less than that of the connected member). Similar remarks can be made regarding the stiffness defining connection rigid or semi-rigid if compared to the stiffness of the connected member. In the past, full-strength connections have been widely adopted especially in moment resisting frames and their structural performance relied on the proper behaviour of welding. However, the research following the 1994 Northridge and 1995 Kobe earthquakes demonstrated the lower than expected performance of welded connections, stimulating the onset and development of pre-qualified connections to be adopted especially in seismic areas. Among these connections the most studied ones are those belonging to the Reduced Beam Section (RBS) typology, being the so-called “dogbone” connection the most adopted. The dogbone presents a bending strength and a flexural stiffness lesser than the ones of the original structural member. Recently, the authors proposed a special device suitably designed to realize an innovative moment resisting connection for steel beam elements belonging to the RBS typology. Such a device, called Limited Resistance Plastic Device (LRPD), is constituted by three different portions: the central one is devoted to the onset and development of plastic deformations and presents geometrical dimensions reduced with respect to those of the original structural member; the external ones are devoted to recover the stiffness of beam-device system to that of the original structural member and present greater geometrical dimensions. This latter remark allows to affirm that, from a connectivity point of view, the stiffness of LRPD at the columnbeam interface, is greater than the one of the original structural member. Another fundamental remark is that the structural connections are intrinsically characterized by uncertainties related either to geometrical or to material ones. Usually, the effect of uncertainties is covered by the use of safety coefficients and the analyses are performed referring only to the nominal values of the geometrical and mechanical characteristics. However, in order to perform a more complete interpretation of the mechanical behaviour of the studied connections, a nondeterministic analysis approach can be used. Aim of the paper is the characterization of the structural behaviour of the referenced connections (“dogbone” and LRPD) taking into account the main geometrical uncertainties and that related to the material strength by performing suitably Monte Carlo simulations and by determining the relevant M-N domains. Starting from the described characterization, different commercial steel profiles will be considered in order to build a series of M-N domains useful to quantify the safety level and the range of usability of the two different RBS approaches. Finally, the implemented applications will lead to demonstrate the greater reliability of LRPD compared to the classical dogbone

Experimental characterization of dacron 360 woven constitutive behavior

In the present paper some experimental analyses of Dacron© 360 woven aimed to characterize its constitutive behavior are presented. This woven, widely adopted in sail manufacturing, is obtained by weaving polyethylene terephthalate (PET) yarn and it shows some peculiar features due to the manufacturing process. The experimental tests, in terms of tensile tests and cyclic tests, clearly show the orthotropy features of the material, its high strength and deformability. Finally, the examination with optical microscope of the tested specimens allows to evidence how the warp and weft yarns interact

On the optimal design of base isolation devices

The paper deals with the optimal design of a base isolation system for a given structure subjected to seismic loads. In particular, an appropriate minimum displacement seismic protection device optimal design formulation is proposed for an assigned elastic perfectly plastic steel frame constrained to behave in conditions of elastic shakedown. The chosen base isolation device is constituted by elastomeric isolators. Suitable combinations of fixed and seismic loads are considered. According to the unrestricted shakedown theory, the seismic input is given as any load history appertaining to a suitably defined seismic load admissibility domain. The relevant dynamic structural response is obtained by means of a modal analysis making reference to the non-classically damped structural model. Some numerical applications conclude the paper