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• We investigate the existence of an 'electoral cycle bias' in media reporting. • We consider the timing of media coverageof news about corruption scandals in Italy. • We analyze how the regional electoral cycles influence coverage of corruption news. • We find evidence of a 'partisan electoral cycle' for different newspapers. We investigate the existence of an 'electoral cycle bias' in the timing of media coverage of news with high political salience. In particular, we analyze how the electoral cycles at the regional level influence the coverage of news about corruption scandals in the Italian Regional Health Systems by two important national newspapers having opposite ideology, La Repubblica (left-wing oriented) and Il Giornale (right-wing oriented). Our findings show that Il Giornale significantly increases the number of articles about corruption scandals involving left-wing politicians since eight weeks before the elections, while it reduces the number of those about episodes of corruption without any political connection. On the contrary, La Repubblica increases the number of articles about episodes involving right-wing politicians only between four to eight weeks before the elections and it decreases those about no political episodes just the week right before them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides evidence on the sources of differences in inequality in educational scores and their evolution over time in four European countries. Using Programme for International Student Assessment data from the 2000 and the 2006 waves, the paper shows that inequality decreased in Germany and Spain (two ‘decentralised’ schooling systems), whilst it increased in France and Italy (two ‘centralised’ systems). The decomposition exercise shows that educational inequality not only does reflect the background related inequality, but also schools' characteristics especially. These characteristics are responsible for the observed evolution over time of inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper, we provide an estimate of the impact of money laundering on residential house market prices. The housing market is commonly exploited by criminal organizations to clean illegal profits. The increase in demand due to money laundering contrasts the negative externality of crime on house prices, which has been investigated by a large literature. We build a new dataset on residential house prices at the provincial level in Italy over the period 2005–2012, obtaining a sample of 672 observations. We then estimate a hedonic equilibrium price model, controlling for proxies both for illegal profits derived from "entrepreneurial" crimes (drug dealing, receiving stolen goods, prostitution) and for violent crimes (extortions), together with traditional market drivers. Adding to the evidence from the traditional literature, which remarks the negative impact of crime on house prices, our findings suggest that money laundering from "entrepreneurial" crimes creates an upward distortion in the housing market prices. The impact is stronger where retail markets for illicit trades are richer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Pandemic in Italy and Spain Italy and Spain share common institutional backgrounds (e.g. decentralized healthcare systems), but adopted a different model of governance during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic ([5]). Comparing the reactions to the pandemic in two countries (Italy and Spain) allows us to study whether hierarchical centralization in Spain fared better than informal decentralized coordination implemented in Italy. Nonetheless, the institutional design of the health system to address the needs of the COVID-19 pandemic was corrected in the second wave of the pandemic, when Spain followed Italy's lead and kept the pandemic governance decentralized. Results (not reported here for brevity) confirm a higher concentration of the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy than in Spain, which implies that centralized governance allows for more homogeneous outcomes across regions, while a decentralized solution allows to identify best practices from those regions that have adopted unsuccessful choices. [Extracted from the article]

Grant-making foundations are private institutions that distribute their income to deserving organisations. In the USA, they enjoy fiscal incentives, but have to comply with complex rules securing that incentives are well deserved. In contrast, European countries have an embryonic legislation. This paper investigates whether the different tax rules adopted in the USA for independent and community foundations influence the grant-making behaviour of these organisations. Our econometric investigation underlines the existence of a large heterogeneity in the activities of both types, suggesting that the introduction of new regulations could benefit from a careful analysis of the nature and the features of these organisations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multigrading represents the practice of mixing children of different ages in the same classroom. This paper examines the effect of attending a multigrade class in Grade 2 on students' academic achievement in Grades 2, 5, and 8, respectively, considering Italy as a case study. To address the issue of endogeneity of multigrading (and class size), we adopt an IV identification strategy based on a law that disciplines class composition. We show that multigrading has a positive (16 percent of a standard deviation) short-term effect on academic achievements. However, this effect diminishes over time and becomes negative (-10 percent of a standard deviation) if students spend several years in a multigrade class. Mechanism analysis indicates the fundamental role of teachers and suggests that the negative long-term effect of multigrading is not statistically different from zero when multigrade classes are taught by more experienced teachers. These findings, based on longitudinal data, reconcile contrasting results in the literature, which are based on cross-sectional data and on the short-term effects of multigrading. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Noninvasive prenatal screening tests help identify genetic disorders in a fetus, but their take-up remains low in several countries. Using a regression discontinuity design, we test the causal effect of a policy that eliminated co-payments for noninvasive screening tests in Italy. We identify the treatment effects by a discontinuity in women's eligibility for a free test based on their conception date. We find that the policy increases the probability of women's undergoing noninvasive screening tests by 5.5 percentage points, and the effect varies by socioeconomic status. We do not find evidence of substitution effects with more expensive and riskier invasive diagnostic tests. In addition, the increase in take-up does not affect pregnancy termination or newborn health. We find some evidence of positive effects on mothers' health behaviors during pregnancy as measured by reductions in mothers' weight gain and hospital admissions during pregnancy, but these are statistically significant only at the 10 percent level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]