We analyze empirically the effects of urban agglomeration on Italian college graduatesﾒ work possibilities as entrepreneurs three years after graduation. We find that each 100,000 inhabitant-increase in the size of the individualﾒs province of work reduces the chances of being an...

We develop a theoretically grounded extension of the two-way fixed effects model of Abowd et al. (1999) that allows firms to differ both in the wages they offer new hires and the wages required to poach their employees. Expected hiring wages are modeled as the sum of a worker fixed effect, a...

This paper investigates labor supply and redistributive effects of in-work benefits for Italian married couples using a tax-benefit microsimulation model and a multi-sectoral discrete choice model of labor supply. We consider two in-work benefit schemes following the key principles of the Earned...

The aim of this paper is to investigate the effect of Employment Protection Legislation (EPL) on fertility decisions of Italian working women using administrative data. We exploit a reform that introduced in 1990 costs for dismissals unmotivated by a 'fair cause' or 'justified motive' in firms...

Efficiency wages theories argue that the threat of firing, coupled with a high unemployment rate, is a mechanism that discourages employee shirking in asymmetric information contexts. Our empirical analysis aims to verify the role of unemployment as a worker discipline device, considering the...

This paper investigates the impact of the public smoking ban which came into effect in Italy on January 2005 on individual smoking behaviour. Current empirical evidence supports the existence of a negative effect of the Italian ban on smoking prevalence and consumption in the general population....

This paper explores newly available Italian data derived from a 1:90 sample of social security administrative records (INPS) to investigate gender differences in pay during the initial stages of a worker's career. We find that a significant and growing pay differential between men and women...

We investigate the impact of fetal exposure to air pollution on health outcomes at birth in Italy in the 2000s combining information on mother's residential location from birth certificates with information on PM10 concentrations from air quality monitors. The potential endogeneity deriving from...

We derive bounds for the average of math and language scores of elementary school students in Italy correcting for pervasive score manipulation. Information on the fraction of manipulated data is retrieved from a natural experiment that randomly assigns external monitors to schools. We show how...

An instrumental variables (IV) identification strategy that exploits statutory class size caps shows significant achievement gains in smaller classes in Italian primary schools. Gains from small classes are driven mainly by schools in Southern Italy, suggesting a substantial return to class size...