Insurance products are distributed both by independent and dependent agents, although the use of independent agents is more costly. The product quality hypothesis states that independent agents provide both insurers and customers with higher service quality and therefore, remain on the market....

The 1993 Survey of Household Income and Wealth, a representative survey of the Italian population covering 24,000 individuals, reports detailed information on children attendance of public and private schools and parents? self-assessment of the quality of public schools in the city of residence....

The Italian credit and financial system was the result of progressive developments that accelerated during the process of Italian unification. Our essay analyses the role of local private bankers in modernizing the economic and financial system of the country and the way in which the gradual...

Early Modern historians have long been fascinated by the mercantile world of the late medieval and early modern periods. The reason for their fascination can be ascribed to the wealth, cosmopolitism, social capital and political clout that many of these merchants (mostly men) projected onto...

The essay examines the contribution provided by Piero, Roberto and Leone Strozzi - sons of the wealthy Florentine banker Filippo Strozzi - to the French war effort in the last two decades of the Ital- ian Wars. A contribution based on their military and diplomatic skills and on the availability...

Monti di Pietà were first founded in the 1460s as public banks whose aim was to provide citizens with solidaristic credit. In this institution, the interplay between the objects pawned and the small money loans granted in exchange was vital and mediated by a wellorganized paper "ecosystem" of...