The aim of this paper is to assess the relationship between individual skills and labour market performance of immigrants residing in Lombardy during the period 2001-2005. We use a recent dataset collected by the NGO ISMU, which includes information on individual characteristics and the legal...

Activity and employment rates for immigrant women in many industrialized countries display a great variability across national groups. The aim of this paper is to assess whether this well-known fact is due to a voluntary decision (i.e. large reservation wages by the immigrants) or to an...

We quantify the private returns and social costs of political connections exploiting a unique longitudinal dataset that combines matched employer-employee data for a representative sample of Italian firms with administrative archives on the universe of individuals appointed in local governments...

This paper analyzes the effects of international trade on the relative demand for skilled workers in Italian local labor markets. We find that exports cause a sizable skill upgrading in the labor force by increasing the average level of education of the workforce and the share of white-collars...