Are credit constraints in Italy really more binding in the South?

Abstract

This paper is motivated by a very practical question: are there significant geographical differences in the accessibility to the credit market on the part of Italian households? The investigation is carried using robust probit model. Estimation is carried out in a Bayesian framework. The results are somewhat surprising, showing that the area where households are more likely to be credit constrained is not the South, as could be easily imagined, but rather the highly developed and industrialized North-West.