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Social scientists, in particular sociologists, claim that the distinction between universalistic and particularistic values is relevant to explaining the social behaviour of individuals (and societies). This paper provides preliminary empirical evidence that supports the claim. It first defines a number of proxies for the degree of particularism embedded into long-celebrated dimensions of social behaviour (trust, political awareness, and associational activities). Then, it shows that the particularistic measures are positively correlated to each other and negatively correlated to some established generalist measures for all dimensions of social behaviour considered, both across and within countries and regions. Moreover, the paper relates that the various proxies for particularism share the same set of covariates (such as low education and income), which are neatly distinguishable from the determinants of the generalist measures.

The aim of this paper is to present an overview of the results of a recent research project by the Bank of Italy. The paper analyses the interplay between historical origins, congestion costs, and agglomeration benefits in shaping the Italian urban system. It shows that urban agglomeration externalities (on wages, productivity, or innovation) tend to be smaller in Italy than in other developed countries; it also shows that the costs of congestion are relatively high and that high housing cost—explained by both physical constraints and public administration inefficiencies—discourage mobility. These features have a relevant impact on the development of an advanced urban system with possible negative consequences on the country’s ability to grow.

IntroductionSince the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, very little data on the epidemiological characteristics among the pediatric population in Africa has been published. This paper examines the age and sex distribution of the morbidity and mortality rate in children with COVID-19 and compares it to the adult population within 15 Sub-Saharan African countries.MethodsA merge line listing dataset using a reverse engineering model shared by countries within the Regional Office for Africa was analyzed. Patients diagnosed within 1 March 2020 and 1 September 2020 with confirmed positive RT-PCR test for SARS-CoV-2 were analyzed. Children’s data were stratified into three age groups: 0-4 years, 5-11 years, and 12-17 years, while adults were combined. The cumulative incidence of cases including its medians and 95% confidence intervals were calculated.Results9% of the total confirmed cases and 2.4% of the reported deaths were pediatric cases. The 12-17 age group in all 15 countries showed the highest cumulative incidence proportion in children. COVID-19 cases in males and females under the age of 18 were evenly distributed. Among adults, a higher case incidence per 100,000 people was observed compared to children.ConclusionThe cases and deaths within the children’s population was smaller than the adult population. These differences can reflect biases in COVID-19 testing protocols and reporting implemented by countries, highlighting the need for more extensive investigation and focus on the effects of COVID-19 in children.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has affected millions of people worldwide. It brought about the implementation of various measures and restrictions at a global level. Iran has been one of the countries with the highest rates of COVID-19 cases. This study reviews the initial outbreak of COVID-19 in Iran and examines the mitigation strategies adopted by the country. Moreover, it reports the socioeconomic challenges faced by the authorities during the efforts to contain the virus. A transdisciplinary literature review was carried out and a political measures timeline was constructed. A broad overview of the initial phase of the COVID-19 outbreak in Iran is presented, starting from the first confirmed case on 19 February 2020 until April 2020. The results of this epidemiological and socioeconomic case review of Iran suggests that the political measures undertaken by the Republic of Iran contributed to the decrease of the prevalence of COVID-19. However, due to the existing financial bottleneck, Iran has faced limited health system resources. Therefore, the response was not sufficient to restrict the spread and the efficient handling of the virus in the long-term.

This note summarizes the most relevant regional features of the fiscal consolidation effort undertaken in Italy as a reaction to the sovereign debt crisis. It is shown how the economic and social implications have been stronger in the Mezzogiorno regions, mostly because of the higher dependence of this area upon the demand triggered by public funds. Then the note discusses the main factors limiting the effectiveness of the actions undertaken in the area of structural reforms and functioning of the public administration, which remains overall worse in the Mezzogiorno.

Aimed at reducing labour market dualism and favouring job creation, in 2015 the Italian government issued new regulations lowering firing costs for newly signed open-ended job contracts. To foster the adoption of the new rules the government introduced also a generous subsidy for firms hiring workers with an open-ended contract. Using microdata on hiring and firing for one Italian region, Veneto, we exploit some differences in the design of the two policies to separately identify the effects of new firing costs on firm hiring. We find that around 8% of gross permanent hires occurred because of the reduction of firing costs (in addition to the positive and large effect of the hiring subsidies). The reform of firing costs contributed also to increase the monthly rate of conversion of fixed-term jobs into permanent positions. As suggested by the theory, we also find that the new firing rules made firms slightly less reluctant to offer permanent job positions to yet untested workers.

The paper shows that time preferences and risk preferences are key covariates of self-reported trust. They both predict negatively a measure of generalized trust; however, risk aversion is positively correlated with an index of particularized trusting behaviour (which refers to the circle of known people).

Population ageing and lack of productivity growth characterize most western countries. We focus on Italy and investigate whether the availability of a young population represents a determinant of manufacturing productivity growth. We follow a historical comparative analysis and provide evidence of the strength of this relation in the past (1861-1911) and today (1961-2011). To account for the sizeable regional heterogeneity characterizing historically the country we use data disaggregated at the provincial level. Our analysis suggests that the availability of a young population represents indeed one of the determinant of manufacturing productivity growth. The strength of the relation was higher in the past than today, but ageing is still nevertheless a factor that cannot be neglected from a policy perspective.

School rankings based on value-added (VA) estimates are subject to prediction errors, since VA is defined as the difference between predicted and actual performance. We introduce a more flexible random forest (RF), rooted in the machine learning literature, to minimize prediction errors and to improve school rankings. Monte Carlo simulations demonstrate the advantages of this approach. Applying the proposed method to data on Italian middle schools indicates that school rankings are sensitive to prediction errors, even when extensive controls are added. RF estimates provide a low-cost way to increase the accuracy of predictions, resulting in more informative rankings, and better policies.

Italian Abstract: Lo scopo di questo lavoro e presentare una panoramica dei risultati di un recente progetto di ricerca della Banca d’Italia. Il lavoro inizia discutendo come il sistema urbano italiano sia stato, in passato, plasmato dall’interazione tra geografia e eventi storici. Piu recentemente, la crescita delle citta e, in particolare, di quelle piu grandi e stata significativamente condizionata dai costi di congestione. Tali costi, elevati anche nel confronto internazionale, dipendono sia da vincoli fisici allo sviluppo residenziale sia da inefficienze della Pubblica amministrazione e dei sistemi di mobilita. A fronte di cio, i benefici dell’agglomerazione (in termini di salari, produttivita o innovazione) sono in Italia minori rispetto a quelli stimati in altre economie avanzate. Queste caratteristiche hanno un impatto rilevante sullo sviluppo di un sistema urbano avanzato, con possibili conseguenze negative sulla capacita di crescita del paese. English Abstract: The aim of this paper is to present an overview of the results of a recent research project by the Bank of Italy. The paper analyses the interplay between historical origins, congestion costs, and agglomeration benefits in shaping the Italian urban system. It shows that urban agglomeration externalities (on wages, productivity, or innovation) tend to be smaller in Italy than in other developed countries; it also shows that the costs of congestion are relatively high and that high housing cost – explained by both physical constraints and public administration efficiency – discourage mobility. These features have a relevant impact on the development of an advanced urban system with possible negative consequences on the country’s ability to grow.

School rankings based on value-added (VA) estimates are subject to prediction errors, since VA is defined as the difference between predicted and actual performance. We introduce the use of random forest (RF), rooted in the machine learning literature, as a more flexible approach to minimize prediction errors and to improve school rankings. Monte Carlo simulations demonstrate the advantages of this approach. Applying the proposed method to Italian middle school data indicates that school rankings are sensitive to prediction errors, even when extensive controls are added. RF estimates provide a low-cost way to increase the accuracy of predictions, resulting in more informative rankings, and more impact of policy decisions. ispartof: ECONOMICS OF EDUCATION REVIEW vol:67 pages:207-215 status: published

The paper uses questions included in the 2010 wave of the Bank of Italy’s Survey on Household Income and Wealth to investigate the role of family transmission of values. It presents three main empirical findings. First, the paper shows that a number of attitudes (generalized and personalized trusting behaviour, risk and time preferences) and outcomes (female labour force participation, fertility, entrepreneurship, productivity) are associated with the values received. Second, it documents that values received from parents are correlated with the values transmitted to descendants. Third, by using respondent moving patterns, the paper highlights that values received are slowly changing even after a discontinuity in the reference environment. Comparisons between first- and second-generation movers suggest that what matters for breaking the family chains are the formative years, when young people somehow strike a balance between the values transmitted by their parents and what they experience in the (possibly different) environment where they grow up.

Italian Abstract: Si descrive l’evoluzione recente del precariato e del turnover nel sistema scolastico italiano, un sistema che ha tradizionalmente sofferto per i molti precari e l’elevata mobilita del personale. Su tali fenomeni ha influito il piano assunzionale straordinario del 2015 e il successivo piano straordinario di mobilita. Gli iscritti alle graduatorie a esaurimento (congelate da un decennio) si sono ridotti (da 124 a 47mila, a cui peraltro vanno aggiunti 34mila iscritti con riserva a seguito di sentenza del Consiglio di Stato). Il precariato e rimasto consistente: gli incarichi annuali sono passati da 118 a 126mila, dal 14,6 al 14,4% come quota della compagine complessiva del personale, nel frattempo cresciuta. Tra i docenti con incarico annuale sono cresciuti quelli, mediamente piu giovani, iscritti nelle cosiddette graduatorie d’istituto, graduatorie per le quali permane la possibilita di accesso senza necessita di un passaggio per un tirocinio post universitario. La mobilita e il turnover, anche al netto del notevole numero di riassegnazioni del personale intervenute durante l’ultimo anno scolastico, si sono impennati. English Abstract: The paper illustrates the recent trends in the use of contract staff and in staff turnover in the Italian education system, traditionally plagued by high levels of job insecurity and turnover. The system has been affected by the extraordinary scheme for hiring permanent teachers in 2015 and a mobility and reallocation plan the following year. The number of people on the national list of untenured teachers (frozen about 10 years ago) shrank from 124,000 to 47,000 (to which we should, however, add another 34,000 teachers added to a reserve list following a judgment by the State Council). The use of contract staff remained largely unchanged: the number of annual job contracts rose from 118,000 to 126,000, and fell from 14.6 to 14.4% as a share of total staff, the numbers of which have grown in the meantime. The share of those on the local lists of supply teachers (yet not required to follow a postgraduate internship program) increased among teachers with a yearly contract, who are on average younger than before. Staff mobility and turnover rose sharply, regardless of problems with implementation which led to a considerable rise in staff reassignment in the last school year.

We use the Italian Labour Force Survey and the European Household Panel Survey to analyse the distribution of the reservation wages reported by job-seekers. In Italy, reservation wages appear to be higher in the South — the low-income and high-unemployment area of the country — than in the North and Centre. A similar, rather counterintuitive, pattern can also be found in Finland, France, and Spain. First, we show that the way in which these data are commonly collected generates double- selection bias. Second, we show that this bias has a strong effect on the estimation of the geographical pattern of reservation wages in many countries. The size of this bias is substantial in Italy. When controlling for it, reservation wages are at least 10 per cent higher in the North and Centre than in the South.

Temporary work has been an important component of employment growth in Italy since the early 1990s. This paper focus upon labour market transitions of temporary workers in order to test whether temporary work enhances the subsequent labour market chances. We use propensity score matching to compare subsequent employment outcomes of people who have recently acquired a temporary job with those of people who remained unemployed. Individuals' hetero geneity explains a good amount of the raw differences in the subsequent labour market status of temporary workers and the comparison group. Yet there appears to be a sizable net gain from experiencing a temporary work. Our benchmark average estimate is a 30 percentage points rise in the ‘satisfactory employment’ chances 1 year after the start of the temporary work experience. The net gains are the largest for females and adult people and the areas with low unemployment; moreover, gains are the largest for the most recent years in our sample and for those people who were (according to the propensity score estimates) either least or most likely to exit from unemployment.

In 2015 Italy adopted two different policies aimed at reducing labour market dualism and fostering employment: a generous permanent hiring subsidy and new regulations lowering firing costs and making them less uncertain. Using microdata for Veneto and exploiting some differences in the design of the policies, we evaluate the impact of each measure. Both contributed to double the monthly rate of conversion of fixed-term jobs into permanent positions. Moreover, around 40 per cent of new total gross hires with permanent job contracts occurred because of the incentives, whereas 5 per cent can be attributed to the new firing regulations. The new firing rules also made firms less reluctant to offer permanent job positions to yet untested workers. The possibility of benefitting from the incentives in case of a conversion also boosted temporary hiring, as it allowed firms to test for the quality of a job match.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the influence of students' reading literacy, measured by the PIRLS (Progress in International Reading Literacy Study) test, on their performance in the TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study) mathematics and science tests. The data on 4,125 Italian students from 199 schools were analyzed: the sample was representative of students in Grade 4, who participated both in TIMSS and PIRLS 2011. Italian descriptive results were compared with those of other countries that participated in both projects. The results showed a high correlation among all three subjects. Repeated measure variance analyses were conducted to determine the effect of reading literacy on mathematics and science performance on the Italian sample. As far as Italian students were concerned, results confirmed the influence of reading literacy on mathematics achievement, whereas the influence of reading literacy on science achievement was not clear.

In this study we investigate the relationship between student achievement and a crucial aspect of teaching: curriculum implementation strategies. More specifically, we consider three strategies representing teachers' approach in dealing with heterogeneous classes: i) spending time on the same topic until everyone understands, ii) moving on to another topic even if part of the class does not understand the previous one, and iii) spending time to revise concepts and topics already studied in the previous year. We exploit the within-student between-subjects variation in the frequency with which different teachers adopt each of the three strategies to control for constant student and class traits and for the possibility that teachers may adapt their strategies to class composition. Our findings show that spending time on the same topic until everyone understands is not associated with a better performance of less able students. On the contrary, it produces substantial achievement losses for the most able ones. Spending time revising topics studied in the previous year increases the achievement of less able students without lowering the performance of the most able ones.

PISA 2012 included an optional computer-based assessment (CBA) focusing on mathematics, reading skills and problem solving. Italian students performed better in the CBA than in the paper-based assessment (PBA). This was not due to any specific features of the student samples in Italy and in the other countries included in the comparison. One of the reasons seems to be that Italian students are less determined in their approach to paper-based tests, during which they often fail to read all the questions and have trouble in finishing in the allotted time. Furthermore, this study finds that students’ competencies as revealed by the CBA are, other things being equal, strongly correlated with those in the paper-based tests, especially in mathematics, and that the pattern of results is almost the same for both kinds of test. Competencies in problem solving are in turn positively associated with a greater familiarity with digital tests. Nevertheless, being excellent in the PBA is not strictly necessary to obtain an excellent result in the CBA as well, since the latter test probably shows talents which are not revealed in paper-based tests, more similar to traditional school exams.

Italian Abstract: L’indagine PISA 2012 includeva alcuni test anche in formato digitale, negli ambiti di matematica, lettura e problem solving. In queste prove, l’Italia ha riportato risultati piu lusinghieri di quelli delle prove cartacee tradizionali. Tale risultato non e frutto di specificita del campione di studenti italiani e dei paesi di confronto nelle prove digitali; un impatto, seppure non esclusivo, lo esercita la bassa determinazione degli studenti italiani, che nelle prove cartacee spesso non completano la lettura delle domande e faticano ad arrivare al termine della prova. Il lavoro evidenzia poi che le competenze rivelate dalle prove digitali per il singolo studente, specie in ambito matematico-quantitativo, sono ceteris paribus fortemente correlate con quelle cartacee e che il pattern dei risultati e analogo; le competenze in problem solving sono a loro volta positivamente associate con una maggiore dimestichezza con le prove digitali. L’essere un’eccellenza nelle prove digitali non necessariamente richiede pero di esserlo anche in quelle cartacee, le prime cogliendo la presenza di talenti inespressi nelle seconde, piu vicine al tradizionale operare delle scuole.English Abstract: PISA 2012 included an optional computer-based assessment (CBA) focusing on mathematics, reading skills and problem solving. Italian students performed better in the CBA than in the paper-based assessment (PBA). This was not due to any specific features of the student samples in Italy and in the other countries included in the comparison. One of the reasons seems to be that Italian students are less determined in their approach to paper-based tests, during which they often fail to read all the questions and have trouble in finishing in the allotted time. Furthermore, this study finds that students’ competencies as revealed by the CBA are, other things being equal, strongly correlated with those in the paper-based tests, especially in mathematics, and that the pattern of results is almost the same for both kinds of test. Competencies in problem solving are in turn positively associated with a greater familiarity with digital tests. Nevertheless, being excellent in the PBA is not strictly necessary to obtain an excellent result in the CBA as well, since the latter test probably shows talents which are not revealed in paper-based tests, more similar to traditional school exams.

The volume collects the essays presented at the conference "Social capital, economics and political economy" held in Rome on 27 June 2014. The first session analyzes definition and measurement issues about social capital. The second and third sessions examine its determinants and economic effects, respectively. The fourth session is devoted to the relationship between social capital and the public sector while the last session concentrates on the role of social capital in credit markets.

This work verifies the consistency of the results of two surveys of Italian students' proficiency: the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) and Italy's national assessment (Invalsi), both conducted in 2012. Focusing especially on the common part of the reference student population (15-year-olds in the second year of high school), the two surveys offer evidence of a similar pattern of achievement differentials in Italy both in relation to different family backgrounds and at the geographical level. The results are also consistent with regard to the overall variance of the scores, although some problems arise in the Invalsi national assessment owing to a significant incidence of cheating and imperfect correction for it, which generates further variability of scores. The two surveys also provide similar results at the level of both individual students and schools. These findings are a good starting point for the joint use and re-designing of the two surveys; in particular, they suggests the advisability of designing ex ante mechanisms for anchoring the Invalsi scores in the metrics provided by PISA, with the indubitable advantage of permitting comparisons across time and with other OECD countries.

In recent years, internal migration in Italy has declined markedly, notwithstanding the widening of the North-South gap in terms of unemployment rates and real income. Here, the extent to which the housing market has contributed to the decline is examined. Preliminary to this analysis, differentials in the cost of housing between the macro-areas of the country are estimated using data on the market price of houses located in 96 provincial capitals. Econometric evidence is provided supporting the view that the North-South housing price differential is a notable factor in explaining the falling pattern of mobility. The positive impact on migration from the South to the North of a wider gap in the two areas in terms of income and employment prospects has been offset by the housing price differential, which has steadily risen at least from the mid-1980s onwards. Yet, a considerable share of the decrease in mobility remains unexplained, possibly owing to the heterogeneity in the composition of migration flows ...

In this paper we propose and validate cheating in standardized tests as a new indirect measure of social capital. Given the low-stakes nature of most of the tests examined here, we interpret the widespread presence of cheating as a signal of limited trustin central education authorities. Cheating is negatively correlated with several social capital proxies in the local environment where a school is located (the municipality or the province), even controlling for area-wide differences in social capital and for a number of features of the local environment. When distinguishing between different kinds of social capital � contrasting universalistic and particularistic social values (along the lines of de Blasio, Scalise and Sestito, forthcoming) � cheating appears to be negatively correlated only with measures of universalistic social values (while the correlation of cheating with particularistic social values, if any, is positive). We also document a number of empirical regularities in cheating behavior: (i) within classes student homogeneity is associated with higher cheating (Lucifora and Tonello, 2012); (ii) the presence of external inspectors greatly reduces cheating (Bertoni, Brunello and Rocco, 2013), and to a greater extent in low social capital environments; (iii) in primary schools, cheating is more pervasive in smaller classes; (iv) and a larger share of �local� teachers, or of teachers with a permanent contract, is generally associated with higher levels of cheating.

Italian Abstract: L’obiettivo di questo lavoro e di verificare la coerenza del quadro complessivo che emerge da due diverse rilevazioni sugli apprendimenti degli studenti italiani (PISA e RN-Invalsi) svoltesi nello stesso anno (2012). Specialmente concentrando l’attenzione sulla parte in comune delle popolazioni di riferimento (gli studenti 15enni in II secondaria di secondo grado), entrambe le fonti restituiscono un quadro simile dei differenziali di performance esistenti tra gli studenti, sia in connessione con il diverso background familiare sia con riferimento al pattern territoriale. Simile e anche il quadro relativo alla variabilita complessiva, sebbene criticita da questo punto di vista si riscontrino nelle RN, per via della presenza di una significativa presenza di fenomeni di cheating e di una imperfetta correzione dello stesso, che genera una ulteriore fonte di variabilita nei risultati. La coerenza tra le due fonti si estende ai risultati dei singoli studenti e soprattutto delle singole scuole. Tali evidenze costituiscono un buon viatico per un uso – e per un ridisegno – congiunto delle due rilevazioni. In particolare, esse suggeriscono l’opportunita di un disegno ex ante di meccanismi di ancoraggio dei risultati delle RN nella metrica fornita da PISA, con il vantaggio di consentire comparazioni nel tempo e nello spazio, rispetto agli altri paesi OCSE. English Abstract: This work verifies the consistency of the results of two surveys of Italian students’ proficiency: the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) and Italy’s national assessment (Invalsi), both conducted in 2012. Focusing especially on the common part of the reference student population (15-year-olds in the second year of high school), the two surveys offer evidence of a similar pattern of achievement differentials in Italy both in relation to different family backgrounds and at the geographical level. The results are also consistent with regard to the overall variance of the scores, although some problems arise in the Invalsi national assessment owing to a significant incidence of cheating and imperfect correction for it, which generates further variability of scores. The two surveys also provide similar results at the level of both individual students and schools. These findings are a good starting point for the joint use and re-designing of the two surveys; in particular, they suggests the advisability of designing ex ante mechanisms for anchoring the Invalsi scores in the metrics provided by PISA, with the indubitable advantage of permitting comparisons across time and with other OECD countries.

The chapter reviews the evolution of educational institutions and outcomes over the 150 years since Italy's unification and discusses their interaction with national and regional growth patterns. Initial educational conditions across regions contributed to differentiate the early industrial take off in the late nineteenth century. Conversely, formal education does not appear to have played a major role in the post-war economic boom. The slowdown of Italy's economy since the 1990s may in part reflect interactions between the country's traditionally low human capital intensity and its new comparative advantage patterns. It may also be due in part to the deterioration of Italy's educational system's organization since the 1970s.

In this paper we test for the effect of technological progress on the labour demand and relative earnings by skill in Italy from 1986 to 1990. We consider a large panel of firms, about 36,000: the data allow us to construct a proxy of the use of new technology by each firm. Our main conclusions are that: (i) wage dispersion in Italy did not increase by the same extent as in the US and UK; (ii) technological progress led to a remarkable increase in the employment of skilled (captured in our data by white-collars) vis-à-vis blue-collar workers. However relative earnings did not experience a similar rise. We suggest that both a shift in the supply of skills and the features of the Italian wage bargaining system counteracted the rise in earnings dispersion.

This paper reviews the evolution of educational institutions and outcomes over the 150 years since Italy’s unification, and discusses their interaction with national and regional growth patterns. While initial educational conditions contributed to differentiate across regions the early industrial take off in the late 19 th century, and formal education does not appear to have played a major role in the postwar economic boom, the slowdown of Italy’s economy since the 1990s may be partly due to interactions between its traditionally low human capital intensity and new comparative advantage patterns, and to the deterioration since the 1970s of the educational system’s organization.

This paper considers the role of preferences in explaining trust. By using the Bank of Italy�s Survey on Household Income and Wealth (SHIW), the paper shows that time preferences and risk preferences are key covariates of self-reported trust. They both predict negatively a measure of generalized trust; however, risk aversion is positively correlated with an index of particularized trusting behaviour (which refers to family and friends). Moreover, the results are robust to using a different data source to gauge the role of social preferences and personality traits. The study highlights that neglecting preferences when analysing the role of trust in explaining socio-economic outcomes might pose serious challenges in terms of omitted variables.

We document the effects of a change in the replacement rate and potential duration of the Italian Ordinary unemployment benefits scheme on the job search process. As of January 2001, benefits were extended from 6 to 9 months selectively for workers aged 50 or more, and the replacement rate was raised from 30 to 40 percent for all workers. We draw on social security records that cover the employment and welfare histories of a representative sample of individuals. Comparisons of eligible and non eligible workers across the relevant age and time thresholds conducted on a variety of samples and conditional on several specifications of the information set suggest that (a) the average duration of benefits’ collection increased by around one month for individuals entitled to 3 additional months of potential duration, while it did not change significantly for those only exposed to higher replacement rates; (b) the pace of reemployment is never found to be statistically different among claimants exposed to the new regime, although point estimates for those exposed to a longer duration point consistently to a 2-4 percentage points lower probability of reemployment at several horizons. Graphical evidence suggests that job-separation rates did not change with the new regime, while take-up apparently did, although the clear cyclical pattern could bias the picture. We conclude that, if any, the behavioral response induced by such institutional change, must have been economically modest. We discuss reasons why the response may have been so subdued.

The problems of Italy�s education system mostly stem from its modus operandi and interactions with the expectations of families and students. The recent signs of improvement in Italian students� proficiency, plausibly reflecting greater emphasis on rigour, could be reinforced by making schools more autonomous and accountable, including in matters of staff management, and with a nationwide programme of support for the schools in greatest difficulty. The cost savings obtained over the years should mostly be reinvested into the system, enhancing teachers� professionalism. In higher education, the increasing supply of degree courses has not affected the typical problems of Italy�s public universities, which: still attract few researchers and students from abroad; are too undifferentiated and unspecialized; have a predominantly local teacher and student base. The renewal begun with the recent university reform, which has challenged the historically self-referential governance of the system, must stimulate more internal competition within the Italian university system with well-defined and stable rules to foster quality and reward merit, and it must also allow individual universities more autonomy so that a more differentiated supply structure can emerge.

Structural reforms are stressed in Europe 2020 as a tool for boosting economic growth and improving social cohesion. Yet tensions often arises between country specificities and goals, on one side, and pressures by partners and EU wide goals on the other side. The paper discusses the European economic governance issues building upon a sketchy historical account of the so called Open Method of Coordination. It is argued that the structural reforms� success depends upon aspects like the variety, ex ante identifiability and easiness to organize of their potential supporters as well as the presence of institutional mechanisms through which it is possible to compensate the potential losers and/or distributing on wider and fairer basis their benefits; furthermore mechanisms capable to contrast the shortsightedness of many political decisions, also favouring the political participation of all often silent stakeholders, are argued as essential. The most important contribution from EU wide pressures and rules is identified in the capacity building of national institution, to be based also upon stringent rules, aiming at fostering national governments� accountability and the policy evaluation tools.

Temporary work has been an important component of employment growth in Italy since the early 1990s. This is not surprising as Italy has substantially removed the obstacles against the use of temporary workers (henceforth ‘temps’ for brevity), while maintaining the rather strict firing regulations applying to permanent ones.

This paper reviews the evolution of educational institutions and outcomes over the 150 years since Italy's unification, and discusses their interaction with national and regional growth patterns. While initial educational conditions contributed to differentiate across regions the early industrial take off in the late 19th century, and formal education does not appear to have played a major role in the postwar economic boom, the slowdown of Italy's economy since the 1990s may be partly due to interactions between its traditionally low human capital intensity and new comparative advantage patterns, and to the deterioration since the 1970s of the educational system's organization.

The paper discusses the economic problem and the institutional features underlying the Nimby syndrome, and illustrates preliminary empirical evidence for Italy. It argues that siting procedures taking local preferences into account should be preferred when the heterogeneity in preferences across communities is greater than the heterogeneity in constructing and operating costs across sites. The elicitation of preferences is better pursued through auction-like mechanisms rather than multilateral negotiations if: the characteristics of the facility and the institutional context are such that credible information about the risks associated with the facility are available; conflicting preferences at the local level can be preliminarily aggregated; and compensations are mainly monetary. Empirical results suggest that the intensity of local opposition is greater when the perceived risk associated with the facility is higher and more concentrated, and the communication between different levels of government poor. The conflict between highly centralized siting procedures and highly decentralized administrative institutions, the difficulty of providing credible information about the risks associated with the facility, and low political commitment are identified as the critical points.

Of particular importance for education policy-makers is the possibility that teacher mobility adversely affects the quality of teaching in schools serving mainly disadvantaged and minority children. This paper examines the main drivers of the mobility of Italian teachers by using applications-to-transfer data. We find that teachers systematically try to move away from schools where teaching is likely to be more difficult because of the student mix or the social context of the school. Given the absence of any criteria other than seniority in regulating teachers’ allocation across schools, disadvantaged students frequently end up with less experienced teachers who are often just waiting to move elsewhere.

The paper compares the quality of Italian Medical schools� freshmen on the basis of the scores obtained in the locally conducted entry exams which are using a common national test frame. The test is quite selective (partly because of the reduced size of the intake yearly allowed): winners are people on average better than the average graduates of their own secondary schools and 15% of them have already had some college education in other fields. Among Universities there appear to be sizable and stable over time differences in the average quality of freshmen; while students from the South have on average worse results in the tests, those of them moving to Northern Universities contribute to the higher average quality of these Universities� freshmen. Comparing, for Dental Surgery schools which have used both, local tests and a national test (the position in the national test governing the priority in the choice of the school where to enroll), it seems that the latter amplifies (shrinks) the difference between (within each of the several) Universities in the freshmen�s composition.

In the Italian system teachers are allocated to schools according to a seniority-based centralized system with no role of individual schools in attracting, selecting and retaining teachers. Largely because of the rather limited pay scale, seniority-based rights to move to a particular school and geographical location represent one of the main career opportunities for tenured teachers. This paper examines the main drivers of the resulting (voluntary) mobility of Italian teachers. We find that the teachers' place of birth (after securing a tenured position, teachers try find work near their place of birth) and several features related to the student mix and the social context of the school are very important. Teachers systematically try to move away from schools where teaching is likely to be more difficult, for example where the students come from a lower socio-economic background and have poorer educational abilities even though teachers could have a more important role in boosting students' human capital accumulation. The centralized allocation system does not appear to equalize opportunities among different school environments. Furthermore, the absence of any criteria other than seniority in regulating teachers' locational preferences produces high staff turnover and a widespread lack of motivation among teachers who, all too often, are simply waiting in one school until they can move on to another.

We use the Italian Labour Force Survey and the European Household Panel Survey to analyse the distribution of the reservation wages reported by jobseekers. In Italy, reservation wages appear to be higher in the South - the low income and high unemployment area of the country - than in the North and Centre. A similar, rather counterintuitive, pattern, however, can also be found in Finland, France and Spain. First, we show that the way in which these data are commonly collected generates double selection bias. Second, we show that this bias has a strong effect on the estimation of the geographical pattern of reservation wages in many countries. The size of this bias is substantial in Italy. When controlling for it, reservation wages are 10 per cent higher in the North and Centre than in the South.

The paper summarizes the framework used in a research project on local public services carried out by Bank of Italy researchers. It discusses motivations, characteristics, results and general lessons of the project, whose sector-specific results are detailed in individual papers. The project was set up to analyze the effectiveness and outcomes of a set of reforms initiated approximately 15 years ago (but still unfinished in many respects). Studies of specific economically important and socially sensitive sectors were performed, to obtain an updated picture of the current framework (ownership structure, role of local authorities) and evaluate performance (market structure, costs and quality, profitability, environmental results). A set of horizontal studies (on the evolution of regulation, the spread of project financing, the growth of some large players) complemented the sectoral analyses. As a whole the project confirmed that the results of the reforms have been unsatisfactory. The paper also discusses some characteristics of the regulatory framework and market structures that could explain the reforms' poor results: a) insufficient attention to sectoral peculiarities in the regulatory design; b) the approach used in determining tariffs that should have covered full costs; c) excessively fragmented regulatory authorities, which were set up at too local a level; d) insufficient separation between the different roles played by local authorities as regulators, majority shareholders of service providers and representatives of consumers' interests.

ficulties we look at the composition of teachers’ pool and to their behaviour in the market in a first attempt to infer some information about their quality and motivation. We show that Italian teachers have traits and behaviour that are consistent with an implicit contract in which relatively low wages are compensated by low involvement in the job and low effort exerted. Next we look at the institutional features that might have motivated this implicit contract. In particular we examine the mechanism that allocates teachers to schools. For each school we construct three indicators; one indicating the level of turnover that we interpret as source of turmoil with potentially negative implications for pupils’ achievement; one that refers to the mismatch between tenured teachers and their school; the third indicator measures the quality of the school as evaluated by the whole population of tenured teachers and thus we name it “revealed preferences indicator”. We show that the geographical and across school distribution of these three indicators resemble that of perceived quality of the schools. While we do not attempt to identify, in any econometric sense, the causal link of these indicators with students performance, we do measure the association at the school level of our indicators with pupils achievement as provided by PISA 2003. It appears that our indicators are strongly correlated to the school’s performance, negatively to the turnover and to the mismatch indicator, positively to the revealed preferences expressed by the whole population of teachers. It seems that teachers know which are the best schools and gradually attempt to move there.

One of the objectives of the reforms and liberalization of the last 15 years in local public services was to reduce the traditional fragmentation of production. This was to be achieved through restructuring that reduced inefficiencies and made it more possible to exploit economies of scale, thereby stimulating the emergence of national “big players”. In this paper we analyze the evolution and current position of the largest operators that have emerged in the different sectors of local public services. The aim is to identify factors that have helped or hindered the growth process. Through an analysis of twelve among the largest businesses we identify four evolutionary paths. In our view the main drivers have been: a) a presence in the energy sector (mainly due to its high profitability); b) a favourable local political framework; and c) a tradition of efficient internal organization and independence of local politics.