Daniel Montolio

Does Social Capital Reduce Crime

We investigate the effects of civic norms and associational networks on crime rates. Civic norms may attach guilt and shame to criminal behavior, thus increasing its opportunity cost. Associational networks may increase returns to noncriminal activities and raise detection probabilities, but they may also work as communication channels for criminals and may offer official cover to criminal activities. The empirical assessment of these effects poses serious problems of endogeneity, omitted variables, measurement error, and spatial correlation. Italy’s great variance in social and economic characteristics, its homogeneity in policies and institutions, and the availability of historical data on social capital in its regions allow us to minimize the first two problems. To tackle the last two problems, we use report‐rate‐adjusted crime rates and estimate a spatial lag model. We find that both civic norms and associational networks have a negative and significant effect on property crimes across Italian provinces.

Assessing the assignation of public subsidies: Do the experts choose the most efficient R&D projects?

espanolLa implementacion de un programa de subvenciones publicas a proyectos empresariales de I+D comporta establecer un sistema de seleccion de proyectos. Esta seleccion se enfrenta a problemas relevantes, como son la medicion del posible rendimiento de los proyectos de I+D y la optimizacion del proceso de seleccion entre proyectos con multiples y a veces incomparables medidas de resultados. Las agencias publicas utilizan mayoritariamente el metodo peer review que, aunque presenta ventajas, no esta exento de criticas. En cambio, las empresas privadas con el objetivo de optimizar su inversion en I+D utilizan metodos mas cuantitativos, como el Data Envelopment Analisis (DEA). En este trabajo se compara la actuacion de los evaluadores de una agencia publica (peer review) con una metodologia alternativa de seleccion de proyectos como es el DEA. EnglishThe implementation of public programs to support business R&D projects requires the establishment of a selection process. This selection process faces various difficulties, which include the measurement of the impact of the R&D projects as well as selection process optimization among projects with multiple, and sometimes incomparable, performance indicators. To this end, public agencies generally use the peer review method, which, while presenting some advantages, also demonstrates significant drawbacks. Private firms, on the other hand, tend toward more quantitative methods, such as Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), in their pursuit of R&D investment optimization. In this paper, the performance of a public agency peer review method of project selection is compared with an alternative DEA method.

Productive Efficiency and Regulatory Reform: The Case of Vehicle Inspection Services

Measuring productive efficiency provides information on the likely effects of regulatory reform. We present a Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) of a sample of 38 vehicle inspection units under a concession regime, between the years 2000 and 2004. The differences in efficiency scores show the potential technical efficiency benefit of introducing some form of incentive regulation or of progressing towards liberalization. We also compute scale efficiency scores, showing that only units in territories with very low population density operate at a sub-optimal scale. Our results suggest that the introduction of new units in the most densely populated territories (a likely effect of some form of liberalization) would not be detrimental in terms of scale efficiency. We also find economies of scale or scope at the firm level. Finally, we show that between 2002 and 2004, a period of high regulatory uncertainty in the sample?s region, technical change was almost zero. Regulatory reform should take due account of scale and diversification effects, while at the same time avoiding regulatory uncertainty.

The Link between Public Support and Private R&D Effort: What is the Optimal Subsidy?

The effectiveness of R&D subsidies can vary substantially depending on their characteristics. Specifically, the amount and intensity of such subsidies are crucial issues in the design of public schemes supporting private R&D. Public agencies determine the intensities of R&D subsidies for firms in line with their eligibility criteria, although assessing the effects of R&D projects accurately is far from straightforward. The main aim of this paper is to examine whether there is an optimal intensity for R&D subsidies through an analysis of their impact on private R&D effort. We examine the decisions of a public agency to grant subsidies taking into account not only the characteristics of the firms but also, as few previous studies have done to date, those of the R&D projects. In determining the optimal subsidy we use both parametric and nonparametric techniques. The results show a non-linear relationship between the percentage of subsidy received and the firms’ R&D effort. These results have implications for technology policy, particularly for the design of R&D subsidies that ensure enhanced effectiveness.

Growth, Convergence and Public Investment. A Bayesian Model Averaging Approach

The aim of this study is twofold. First, the determinants of economic growth are studied among a wide set of potential variables for the Spanish provinces (NUTS3). Among others, various types of private, public and human capital in the group of growth factors are included. Also, it is analysed whether Spanish provinces have converged in economic terms in recent decades. The second objective is to obtain cross-section and panel data parameter estimates that are robust to model specification. For this purpose, a Bayesian Model Averaging (BMA) approach is used. Bayesian methodology constructs parameter estimates as a weighted average of linear regression estimates for every possible combination of included variables. The weight of each regression estimate is given by the posterior probability of each model.

Local Public Expenditures and Housing Prices

This paper estimates a hedonic price model which makes it possible to determine how the price of a unit varies with the set of attributes it possesses, in the Spanish housing market. Concretely, and by means of capitalisation, hedonic price models can be used as an instrument to capture how local public expenditures influence housing prices and, by extension, how homeowners can indirectly receive benefit from local public investment. Using individual data for dwellings from the city of Barcelona (Spain) for the period 1998—2001, it is found that local policies aimed at enhancing the quality of life or the location-specific characteristic of the city of Barcelona have a positive impact on housing values.

Regulatory federalism and industrial policy in broadband telecommunications

We analyse the impact of regulation, industrial policy and jurisdictional allocation on broadband deployment using a theoretical model and an empirical estimation. Although central powers may be more focused and internalize interjurisdictional externalities, decentralized powers may internalize local horizontal policy spillovers and use a diversity of objectives as a commitment device in the presence of sunk investments. The latter may, for instance, alleviate the collective action problem of the joint use of rights of way and other physical infrastructures. In the empirical exercise, using data for OECD and EU countries for the period 1999-2006, we examine whether centralization promotes new telecommunications markets, in particular the broadband access market. The existing literature, in the main, claims it does, but we find no support for this claim in our data. Our results show that indicators of national industrial policy are a weakly positive determinant of broadband deployment and that different measures of centralization are either irrelevant or have a negative impact on broadband penetration.

What types of firms acquire knowledge intensive services and from which suppliers

Knowledge intensive services and, in particular, R&D services contribute significantly to innovation in firms. The objective of this paper is to find out which characteristics of firms explain the acquisition of R&D services and to analyse whether there are differences depending on the typology of the supplier (universities, technology centres and consulting firms). Three main conclusions emerge from the econometric estimations carried out with information from a survey of innovative firms in the region of Valencia in Spain. First, the results show that firm size and age matter in the decision to buy R&D services. Second, our results are consistent with the relevance that the literature gives to human capital in absorbing external knowledge. Third, innovation policy has a significant influence on the decision to acquire R&D services, particularly from universities and technology centres.

Juvenile crime in Spain

This article studies the role of age structure and gender on crime rates across Spanish regions. Using a regional dataset for the period 1993 to 2003, and after controlling for social and economic factors such as unemployment, urbanization, migration, regional welfare and economic development, results support the existence of an age-crime profile: Spanish youngsters are more prone to commit crime.

Funding and School Accountability: The Importance of Private and Decentralised Public Funding for Pupil Attainment

We discuss the issue of how schools should be financed, concentrating on the role of private funding and public funding via sub-national governments as accountability mechanisms in the provision of educational services. The historical evolution of school regulation in Italy and Spain has created differences in the percentage of pupils who attend private schools, the percentage of private school funding coming from public and private sources, and the percentage of public school funding that comes from central or local government sources. We take advantage of these institutional diversities rooted in history to estimate the disciplining role of these different sources of funding in the context of an educational production function using PISA data. Our results provide support to both accountability mechanisms, and point to the presence of an important interplay between them. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved