The public health literature focusing on the detrimental effects of social isolation has shown that the quantity of social connections is positively correlated with individual health. Drawing on pooled cross-sectional data, we test this hypothesis on a representative sample of the Italian...

This paper examines the determinants of innovation and its effects on small- and medium-sized firms We use the data from the OPIS databank, which provides a survey on a representative sample of firms from a province of the Southern Italy. We want to study whether small and medium sized firms can...

Since the pioneering contributions of Balassa (1966) and Grubel and Lloyd (1975) revealed a remarkable incidence of simultaneous exports and imports within industries (intra-industry trade) in the foreign trade structure of developed countries, a large body of academic work has expanded...

The labour market in Italy is characterised by the following structurally specific features: 1) Regional differentials. In 1996 the unemployment rate was between 7% and 10% in Central and Northern regions, while it was over 21% in the South where, moreover, the participation rate was also low,...

The aim of the paper is to endorse the principle, recurrent in non-profit literature, that the third sector is an institution that supports the development process of economic systems. The third sector is considered as an institution that –favors, transmits and cements– the role of social...

In this paper we investigate the effects of different fiscal policies on the firm choice to produce underground. We consider a tax evading firm operating simultaneously both in the regular and in the underground economy. We suggest that such a kind of firm, referred to as moonlighting firm, is...

The present study characterizes the equilibrium set of economic dynamics under learning and sequential equilibrium when time is continuous. Sufficient conditions for the exact identification of the period of cycles are given. In particualr, the omega limit set can be the union of closed curves...

Dropping out of school has recently become an issue of major policy concern in Italy. A series of reforms of secondary school objectives, programmes and organizational design have been proposed to adapt the public school system to evolutions in the labour market and to increase overall...

This paper attempts a qualitative and quantitative evaluation of the ability of the Italian Active Labour Market Policy (ALMP) to target long term youth unemployed. The European Employment Strategy (EES) has given a new impulse to ALMP as the main tool to fight long term youth unemployment. It...

This study investigates the relationship between the female labour force participation and the female employment rate in Italy by adopting non-linear econometric modelling. In our specification we are unable to reject a nonlinear relationship. This implies that the discouraged worker effect is...