We randomly assign student profiles to teachers and elicit teachers' beliefs about the student's likelihood of success in alternative high school tracks. We document a large and statistically significant gradient in teachers' beliefs about students' high school prospects with respect to...

We use the variation of training policy over time and across Italian regions to identify the relationship between individual training and earnings. Using longitudinal data for the period 1999 to 2005, we find that the marginal effect of one additional week of formal training on monthly earnings...

We ask whether local agglomeration affects how recessions impact on entrepreneurship by comparing the probability of being an entrepreneur before and after the Great 2008 Recession in local labour markets where industrial districts are present and in comparable areas. Using Italian Labour Force...

We study whether the combined significant reduction in the pupil-teacher ratio and increase in parental education observed in Italy between the end of World War II and the end of the 1980s have had a significant impact on the educational attainment and the labor market returns of a...

Due to pension reforms, minimum retirement age increased substantially in Italy between the second part of the 1990s and the early 2000s. We compare the training participation of pre- and post-reform cohorts of private sector employees and estimate that adding one year to minimum retirement age...

We provide the first estimates of the impact of managers' risk preferences on their training allocation decisions. Our conceptual framework links managers' risk preferences to firms' training decisions through the bonuses they expect to receive. Risk-averse managers are expected to select...

We analyze workers' risk preferences and training investments. Our conceptual framework differentiates between the investment risk and insurance mechanisms underpinning training decisions. Investment risk leads risk-averse workers to train less; they undertake more training if it insures them...

This paper extends standard models of work-related training by explicitly incorporating workers' locus of control into the investment decision. Our model both differentiates between general and specific training and accounts for the role of workers and firms in training decisions. Workers with...

Using a representative sample of European firms, we study whether and to what extent financing constraints affect employers' decision to invest in employee training. We combine survey data on investment activities with administrative data on financial statements to develop an index of financing...

We estimate the effect of the high school curriculum (or track) on the returns to college using data from the Italian PLUS (Participation Labour and Unemployment Survey) survey. We find that college graduates with vocational high school are less likely to be employed than graduates with academic...