Unemployment scarring in high unemployment regions

This paper investigates the effect of individual unemployment experiences on re-employment wages. The empirical analysis is carried out on a panel of Italian individuals. The main result is that while in the northern regions the effect is similar to the one estimated for the UK, in the southern area of the country the impact is not significant. We link this result to the particular socio-economic environment in which the unemployment spells are experienced. We argue that this might be due to the fact that in a high unemployment environment individual unemployment experiences are perceived as "normal" and do not necessarily signal poor quality of the worker. This might have effects in inducing the hysteresis of unemployment, and reducing the downward pressure of unemployment on wages at the macro level.

Family Income and Students’ Mobility

This paper investigates the reasons that determine students’ mobility in Italy and tries to explain why in the presence of quality differentials among universities the majority of students choose to remain in their regions of origin. We find that low mobility is related to family income and other financial and background characteristics. Low mobility in turn implies the existence of little competition among universities, and hence little incentive for improvement in either teaching or research. A crucial issue is therefore to evaluate if and how the government may affect this process and improve the supply of higher education quality and the degree of competition among academic institutions.Higher education, University choice, Liquidity constraints

Testing for asymmetry in economic time series using bootstrap methods

In this paper we show that phase-scrambling bootstrap offers a natural framework for asymmetry testing in economic time series. A comparison with other bootstrap schemes is also sketched. A Monte Carlo analysis is carried out to evaluate the size and power properties of the phase-scrambling bootstrap-based test.Asymmetric time series

Average Labor Taxes and Unemployment: Evidence from Italian Regions

By focusing on the Italian experience, we ask whether the relationship between labor taxes and unemployment varies across regions. In spite of similar national labor market institutions, we show that this relationship is significantly stronger in the highly industrialized North than in the less developed South, where unemployment is much higher. An important source of variation in the regional responsiveness of unemployment originates from the fact that regional gross wages in the North increase more than in the South in response to a hike in labor taxes.regional unemployment, labor taxes.

Family Income and Students Mobility

This paper investigates the reasons that determine students mobility in Italy and tries to explain why in the presence of quality differentials among universities the majority of students choose to remain in their regions of origin. We find that low mobility is related to family income and other financial and background characteristics. Low mobility in turn implies the existence of little competition among universities, and hence little incentive for improvement in either teaching or research. A crucial issue is therefore to evaluate if and how the government may affect this process and improve the supply of higher education quality and the degree of competition among academic [email protected]@unical.itpublished in Giornale degli Economisti e Annali di Economia, vol 68 (2009), no. 1, pp. 1-23

Widening differences in Italian regional unemployment

Regional unemployment differentials among Italian regions have widened since the mid 1980s, especially between the leading Northern and Central areas and the underdeveloped South. We suggest that the following elements are important to explain the observed phenomenon: a) employment performance in the South has worsened considerably in the presence of sustained labour force growth; b) labour mobility from the South to the NC areas has sensibly declined with the reduction in earnings differentials and with the increase in social transfers per head; c) real wages in the South are not affected by local unemployment conditions but depend on the unemployment rate prevailing in the leading areas; d) the labour share increased particularly fast in the South during the 1970s, mainly as a consequence of the elimination of institutions that allowed the presence of significant wage differentials; e) a parsimonious description of the increase in regional unemployment differentials is that the Northern and Southern areas responded in an asymmetric way both to the increase in real social transfers per head and to the reduction in the real price of energy

Regional disparities and the Italian NAIRU

In this paper we estimate the Italian NAIRU using annual data for the period 1951-1996. We find evidence consistent with aggregate wage setting in Italy depending only on the rate of unemployment prevailing in the Northern and Central areas of the country. There is evidence supporting the presence of a long-run co-integrating relationship among unemployment in the Northern and Central areas, the tax wedge, the real interest rate and a measure of union power. The response of unemployment to exogenous shocks is sluggish, suggesting that persistence is an important feature of the Italian labour market

Beyond national institutions: Labour taxes and regional unemployment in Italy

By focusing on the Italian experience, we ask whether the relationship between labour taxes and unemployment varies across regions. In spite of similar national labour market institutions, we show that this relationship is significantly stronger in the highly industrialised North than in the underdeveloped South, where unemployment is much higher. An important source of variation in the regional responsiveness of unemployment originates from the fact that regional gross wages in the North increase more than in the South in response to a hike in labour taxes. Regional wage setting affects regional employment (and unemployment) both directly and indirectly, via its impact on regional profits and the capital stock

Early Enrollees and Peer Age Effect: First Evidence from INVALSI Data

This paper estimates peer age effect on educational outcomes of Italian pupils attending primary school by exploiting changes in enrollment rules over the last few years. The empirical procedure allows to understand if there is selection in classroom formation, arguing that in the absence of pupils sorting by early age at school entry, it is possible to estimate the “true” peer age effect. Results suggest that the proportion of youngest students “in advance” in the classroom has a positive impact on child’s achievements measured by Normalized and Rasch test scores both in Reading and Mathematics. Additional empirical evidence shows that the effect on individual scores of sharing the classroom with pupils “in advance” differs by students’ age group and it is higher for youngest pupils. Findings do not seem to be invalidated by “cheating” phenomena that may occur during the implementation and evaluation of tests