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How global warming affects human development is a central question for economists as well as social scientists. While most of the literature has focused on the impact of weather on income, less is known on the relationship between climate and local human development. This paper considers shocks in precipitation, temperature, and an original measure of soil aridity to first exploit the association between climate warming and human development, and second, on its dimensions. We show that while precipitations do not have a significant long-term impact on human development growth, variations in temperature and potential evapotranspiration negatively affect two of the three determinants of the Human Development Index, namely life expectancy at birth and education. These results suggest that other climate indicators, such as the potential evapo-transpiration of the soil, should be considered in addition to the standard indicators, when evaluating the localized economic effects of climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this short communication is to estimate the effects of the implementation of more restrictive lockdown measures on pollution levels in Italy. Using a time series of weekly concentrations of PM10, PM2.5 and NO2 for the period 2016–2020 across 71 provinces, we find that the introduction of lockdown measures reduced the air concentration levels of PM10 and NO2 by 17–18%, while their effect on PM2.5 remains unclear. These results indicate that the lockdown had a significant positive impact in terms of lives saved and improved air quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to evaluate the effects of a road pricing scheme in Milan (the Ecopass) on accidents. As the policy was introduced in January 2008, we exploit this exogenous variation to analyse the trend of the time series of the number of accidents, the number of injuries and deaths and in different areas through a regression discontinuity design approach. We find evidence of an overall reduction in accidents in the whole city ( $$-$$ 16 %), with a more pronounced effect in the treated area ( $$-$$ 18.8 %). The effect on severity of accidents is limited as only a significant reduction in the number of injuries could be detected, whereas no effect was found for the number of deaths. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Local governments are increasingly adopting road pricing schemes to curb pollution and congestion in the cities. Despite its popularity, few empirical studies have made an attempt to estimate the effectiveness of such interventions. The aim of this paper is to assess the impact of road pricing on traffic flows by means of a synthetic control approach which allows for a wide heterogeneity of treatment effects. By using a large sample of 75 types of vehicles entering the centre of Milan between 2008 and 2012, we evaluate the enforcement of the road pricing scheme occurred in January 2012 across 20 types of vehicles. We have found a large variation in the reaction of traffic flows and a significant effect in terms of vehicles reduction after pricing for cars and for some types of commercial vehicles. Interestingly and surprisingly, no effect is detected for vehicles whose access in the city centre was forbidden. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the effect of homeownership on saving preferences of individuals by eliciting answers to a direct question on desired precautionary saving, collected on a representative sample of the Italian population. We have found no evidence for a direct impact of homeownership, whereas we have found a strong and positive impact of housing prices volatility on saving preferences of homeowner. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the knowledge era, the importance of highly-qualified human capital has been widely recognized as a key factor for local economic development, especially for those areas specialized in science and technology (S&T). Assuming a regional perspective, the capacity to attract this kind of people is both a sign of territorial competitiveness and a way to further reinforce this by boosting the quality of the local labour market in a self-reinforcing process. In line with this perspective, universities play a fundamental role because they can attract students from elsewhere, and then provide local firms with qualified workers. On the other hand, this process is particularly detrimental for territories suffering 'brain drain'. This paper aims to show this process of selective migration in the case of Italian S&T university students. Specifically, we use a spatial gravity model to show that university students move from Southern towards Northern regions to study in S&T universities, and this mechanism is driven by the dynamism of local labour markets, and not just by the quality of universities. In our view, these results are supportive of the hypothesis that skill-biased migration occurs also very early in the lives of migrants, i.e., at the time they choose university. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies have highlighted the role of geography and institutions as key determinants of urban development. In this paper, we test this hypothesis by considering the case of Italian cities over a very long time period, i.e., from 1300 to 1861. Our measure of development is the urban population, and we relate it to geographical and institutional variables at both city and regional level. We find that the quality of institutions as measured by the experience of free city-state and the presence of a university has a positive effect on urban development, whereas we could not find a robust impact of the quality of regional government. However, we also find that cities located in mountain areas grew less than cities located in lowlands, possibly with access to the sea. We interpret these results as evidence of the importance of urban institutions and geography in shaping urban development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using the stochastic frontier approach based on Farrel's index to measure technical and allocative efficiency, we investigate the level of productive efficiency in Italian regions for the period 1970–1994. We found a 31% of technical inefficiency and about 21% of allocative inefficiency. The analysis is extended to measure the impact of public capital puzzle on regional productivity. The results show that infrastructure play an important role and that railways and maritime capital have an higher degree of effectiveness than the provision of roads. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]