European welfare states. Does decentralization affect poverty?

The shifting of welfare systems to the local level may have positive or negative consequences. On the one hand, it may be argued that local governments better tailor welfare policies to the specific needs of population, given their direct knowledge of territory; on the other hand, especially in the presence of weak su- pervision by the central government, decentralization may cause inequalities and territorial fragmentation. The main objective of the paper is to explore the relation- ship between welfare state typologies - with different degrees of decentralization - and the level of monetary poverty and material deprivation of citizens. Using data from official statistics, we model individual binary outcomes (living or not under the poverty line, being or not able to make ends meet) as a function of both family- level and country-level characteristics. The empirical analysis is run on a selection of European countries for the year 2013

Features of the hidden labour in Italy. An empirical analysis based on the matching of survey and administrative data

In this paper, record linkage is applied to detect hidden (or irregular) workers in the Italian labour market. The idea is to trace each single worker in a survey as well as in a set of administrative registers, where the worker should appear if regular. When a worker is sampled by the survey but he does not appear in any of the administrative registers, that worker is identified as irregular. Subsequently, we estimate a logistic regression model to identify the individual and household features, which characterize the typical hidden Italian worker

Integrating Survey and Administrative Data on Local Social Protection

Welfare systems can be observed according to two different perspectives. The former deals with the supply of social protection, i.e. with the funding and provision of social benefits and the production of social services and goods. The latter focuses on the demand of social protection, and particularly on the characteristics of people benefiting from social protection or asking for it. Typically, data on the supply of social benefits have an administrative nature (registers and budgets data) whereas data on beneficiaries come from sample surveys. In theory, administrative data, being census data, can be detailed by territory. On the contrary, sample surveys are usually planned to provide accurate estimates at the national level or for large sub-national areas. This chapter provides an example on the use of different data sets for the Old age and Family/children functions at the province level (LAU 1 in the EU nomenclature). Data on the supply of benefits derive from the SISSIM (Istat Survey on Interventions and Social Services of Individual and associated Municipalities) and from municipalities' budgets. Data on the demand of social protection come from EU-SILC (European Union - Statistics on Income and Living Conditions), a survey that is annually conducted by Istat in a comparable European framework. Earned benefits are estimated applying small area estimation methods, given that the sample size of the EU-SILC survey at the province level is small, so the traditional design-based estimators usually are unreliable. Results are analysed to understand whether administrative and sample survey data can be used to to compose a coherent picture of social protection delivered at the provincial level

Economic support to European households in the aftermath of COVID-19. A cross-country comparative analysis based on quarterly sector accounts

In response to the COVID-19 outbreak, governments in European countries adopted a wide range of containment measures to prevent the spread of the virus. These measures led to unprecedented short-term economic loss for national economies, to which governments responded with support measures targeting both households and businesses. In this article, we argue that official statistics are a key source for robust comparisons of the economic impact of COVID-19 and subsequent support measures across countries. In particular, we use Eurostat’s quarterly non-financial sector accounts and supplementary information provided by countries to estimate and compare the support received by households in 18 European countries. We focus our analysis on the second and third quarter of 2020, when national economies in Europe were impacted mostly by the containment measures. The results show some heterogeneity in the type and extent of support provided. Interestingly, while in some countries support interventions were far from making up for the loss of income, in others they far outweighed i

Células Ganglionares de la Retina en Aves Rapaces Strigidae: Distribución y Morfometría

SUMMARY: The authors studied the morphometry and the topographical distribution of Retinal Ganglion Cells (RGCs) in four nocturnal raptors of the order of Strigiformes, family of Strigidae: little owl, tawny owl, scops owl, eared owl. In order to recognize specialized retinal vision areas (fovea and visual streak), the number of RGCs/mm2 and the soma size in the four retinal fields (dorsal, ventral, temporal and nasal) by the histological analysis of retinal radial sections were recorded. A temporal fovea was identified in little owl, tawny owl and eared owl while in scops owl this visual area was localized near the fundus oculi. A radial visual streak ventrally directed was pointed out in the retinas of the four raptors with different shape according to its width. The Authors linked the obtained data with the predatory behavior of nocturnal raptors in their habitat. RESUMEN: Se estudió la morfometría y la distribución topográfica de las células ganglionares de la retina (CGR) en cuatro aves rapaces nocturnas del orden de los Strigiformes, familia Strigidae: búho pequeño, mochuelo, autillo, y cárabo. Con el objetivo de definir las áreas de visión retiniana especializadas (fóvea y campo visual), se registró el número de CGRs/mm2 y el tamaño del soma en los cuatro campos retinianos (dorsal, ventral, temporal y nasal), mediante análisis histológico de las secciones radiales de la retina. Se identificó una fóvea temporal en mochuelo, búho leonado y búho pequeño, mientras que en el búho real, esta área visual se localizó cerca del fondo de ojo. Se observó un campo radial visual dirigido ventralmente en las retinas de las cuatro aves rapaces, con diferentes formas según su extensión. Se relacionaron los datos obtenidos con el comportamiento predatorio de aves rapaces nocturnas en su hábitat

Wild cat and domestic cat: domestication or taming ?

This study point out the relationship between wild cat and domestic cat correlating the craniometric data of wild cats from literature to those from bone remains of the Museum of Veterinary Anatomy (University of Pisa). The morphological and morphometrical features closely associated with behavioral attitudes confirm the hypothesis that the cat would be considered as a taming animal

Active Labor Market Policies and Transitions to Permanent Employment. The Potential of Administrative Data

This chapter aims at shedding some light on the effectiveness of existing Active Labor Market Policies. The main goal of this contribution is to show how it is possible to combine three sources of administrative data, namely the system of Compulsory Communications (Comunicazioni Obbligatorie CO), the archives of local agencies in charge of active labor market policies, and the equivalent economic/financial status indicator (EES) data drawn from fiscal assistance centers. We also discuss possible identification strategies to assess the effectiveness of active labor market programs which exploit discontinuity stemming from labor market reforms. Finally, we use event history analysis to model the time to exit to a permanent job as a function of individual characteristics previous labor experience and participation to programs

Assessing the Impact of Agricultural Research: Data Requirements and Quality of Current Statistics in Europe

Assessing the impact of agricultural research on sustainability targets often implies to face two main issues: the complexity of the causal path, and the lack of appropriate data. In this paper, we discuss which data would be necessary to measure short- and long-term impacts in Europe, and suggest a set of indicators to evaluate their quality, exploiting both available metadata (qualitative indicator) and the evidence stemming from the data themselves (quantitative indicator based on missing values, temporal contiguity and outliers). An application is shown for a subset of variables. According to our results, qualitative and quantitative indicators often provide conflicting information

Assessing the impact of agricultural research: Data requirements and quality of current statistics in Europe

Assessing the impact of agricultural research on sustainability targets often implies to face two main issues: the complexity of the causal path, and the lack of appropriate data. In this paper, we discuss which data would be necessary to measure short- and long-term impacts in Europe, and suggest a set of indicators to evaluate their quality, exploiting both available metadata (qualitative indicator) and the evidence stemming from the data themselves (quantitative indicator based on missing values, temporal contiguity and outliers). An application is shown for a subset of variables. According to our results, qualitative and quantitative indicators often provide conflicting information