Sauro Mocetti

With a little help from abroad: the effect of low-skilled immigration on the female labor supply

In this paper we examine whether and how the inflow of female immigrants who “specialize�? in household production affects the labor supply of Italian women. To identify the causal effect, we exploit the family reunification motive and the network effects - i.e. the tendency of newly arriving female immigrants to settle in places where males of the same country already live - as an instrument for the geographical distribution of female foreign workers. We find that the higher the number of immigrants who provide household services the more time native Italian women spend at work (intensive margin) without affecting their labor force participation (extensive margin). The impact is concentrated on the highly skilled women whose time has a higher opportunity cost. These results also hold after a battery of robustness checks. Some further evidence confirms that the impact passes through the substitution in household work rather than complementarities in the production sector. Finally, we show that immigration arises as a substitute to publicly provided welfare services, although this raises concerns about the fairness and the sustainability of this private and informal welfare model.

Tax morale and public spending inefficiency

Tax evasion is a widespread phenomenon and encouraging tax compliance is an important and much debated policy issue. Many studies have shown that tax cheating has to be attributed to a considerable extent to the tax morale of taxpayers. The aim of the present paper is to shed light on the relationship between the taxpayer and the public sector. Specifically, we investigate whether public spending inefficiency shapes individual tax morale. Combining data from Italian municipalities’ balance sheets with individual data from a properly designed survey on tax morale, we find that the attitude towards paying taxes is better when resources are spent more efficiently. This does not appear to be due to some confounding factors at the municipality level or to spatial sorting of citizens. It is also robust to alternative measures of both inefficiency and tax morale.

How does immigration affect native internal mobility? New evidence from Italy

This paper investigates the relationship between native internal mobility and immigration in Italy, in order to gain a better understanding of the impact of immigration on local labour markets and to gauge the consequences for the socio-demographic composition of the local population. Native mobility is examined both with respect to residential displacements across regions and the demographic evolution of local labour markets. Endogeneity issues related to immigrant geographical distribution are addressed using proximity to i?½gatewaysi?½ as the instrumental variable. We find that immigration is positively associated with inflows of highly-educated natives, suggesting the existence of potential complementarities. The impact is concentrated among young adults and is higher in more urbanized areas. We also find a displacement of low-educated natives; in particular, immigrant concentration in the northern regions has partially substituted the traditional South-North mobility of less-skilled natives.

Intergenerational Earnings Mobility in Italy

Abstract This paper contributes to the growing number of studies on intergenerational mobility by providing a measure of earnings elasticity for Italy. The absence of an appropriate data set is overcome by adopting the two-sample two-stage least squares method. The analysis, based on the Survey of Household Income and Wealth, shows that intergenerational mobility is lower in Italy than it is in other developed countries. We also examine the reasons why the long-term labor market success of children is related to that of their fathers.

Don't stand so close to me: the urban impact of immigration

We examine the impact of immigration on segregation patterns and housing prices in urban areas. We develop a spatial equilibrium model that shows how the effect of an immigrant inflow in a district affects local housing prices through changes in how natives perceive the quality of their local amenities and how this influences their mobility. Predictions of the model are tested by using a novel dataset on housing prices and population variables at the district level for a sample of 20 large Italian cities. To address endogeneity problems, we adopt an instrumental variable strategy which uses historical enclaves of immigrants across districts to predict current settlements. We find that immigration raises average house prices at the city level, while it reduces price growth in the district affected by the inflow vis-a-vis the rest of the city. We provide evidence that this pattern is driven by native-flight from immigrant-dense districts towards other areas of the same city. These findings are consistent with a negative effect of immigrants on natives perceived local amenities.

Natural Disasters, Growth and Institutions: A Tale of Two Earthquakes

We examine the impact of natural disasters on GDP per capita by applying the synthetic control approach. Our analysis encompasses two large-scale earthquakes that occurred in two different Italian regions in 1976 and 1980. We show that the short-term effects are negligible in both regions, though they become negative if we simulate the GDP that would have been observed in absence of financial aid. In the long-term, our findings indicate a positive effect in one case and a negative effect in the other, largely reflecting divergent patterns of the TFP. Consistently with these findings, we offer further evidence suggesting that a quake and related financial aids might either increase technical efficiency via a disruptive creation mechanism or reduce it by stimulating corruption, distorting the markets and deteriorating social capital. We finally show that the bad outcome is more likely to occur in areas with lower pre-quake institutional quality. As a result, our evidence suggests that natural disasters are likely to exacerbate differences in economic and social development.

Inequality and Trust: New Evidence from Panel Data

The relationship between inequality and trust has attracted the interest of many scholars who have found a negative relationship between the two variables. However, the causal link from inequality to trust is far from being identified and the existing empirical evidence admittedly remains weak, as the omitted variable bias, reverse causation and/or measurement error might be at work. In this paper, we reconsider the country-level evidence to address this issue. First, we exploit the panel dimension of the data, thus controlling for any country unobservable time-invariant variables. Second, we provide instrumental variable estimates using the predicted exposure to technological change as an exogenous driver of inequality. According to our findings, income inequality significantly and negatively affects generalised trust. However, this result only holds for developed countries. We also explore new insights on the effects of different dimensions of inequality, exploiting measures of both static inequality – such as the Gini index and top income shares – and dynamic inequality – proxied by intergenerational income mobility.

I Prezzi Delle Case E Il Gradiente Centro-Periferia: Evidenze Dalle Città Italiane (The House Price Gradient: Evidence from Italian Cities)

Italian Abstract: Il lavoro analizza la variabilità territoriale dei prezzi delle case, concentrandosi in particolare sul gradiente dal centro verso i quartieri e i comuni periferici. Le differenze lungo queste dimensioni nelle aree urbane sono ampie, anche più di quelle esistenti tra Centro Nord e Mezzogiorno. Le più elevate quotazioni immobiliari al centro dipendono da pressioni centripete dal lato della domanda (connesse anche al tipo di attività economiche svolte sul territorio) cui l’offerta si adegua solo in parte. Una migliore dotazione infrastrutturale e una maggiore facilità di spostamento, tuttavia, possono rendere le periferie meno distanti e attenuare, pertanto, il prezzo della vicinanza al centro e l’inclinazione del gradiente. La distribuzione dei prezzi delle case sul territorio rispecchia, infine, quella dei redditi, sebbene la prima presenti differenze più marcate; il rapporto tra il valore degli immobili e il reddito è più elevato al centro delle città e più contenuto nelle periferie. English Abstract: The paper examines the geographical variability in house prices, focusing on the gradient from the center to peripheral areas. The results reveal large price differentials in the main urban areas, even more than those between the Centre-North and South. The higher real estate prices in the centers of urban areas are affected by centripetal pressures from the demand side (also related to the local economic activities) to which supply only partially adjusts. We find that better infrastructures and lower commuting times can, however, bring the suburbs closer to the center and accordingly mitigate the cost of living centrally and the inclination of the gradient. Finally, we find a center-periphery gradient also for incomes, though this is less steep than that of house prices; it follows that the ratio between the value of houses and income is higher in the city center and lower in the periphery.

The short-term effects of Emilia's earthquake on regional economic growth

Between May and June 2012 a series of earthquakes occurred in the Po Valley in Emilia, causing deaths and widespread damages to buildings and manufacturing plants. The negative economic consequences include, beyond direct damages, also indirect costs (e.g. economic loss through production chains with the damaged firms). This paper estimates the overall short-term impact on the GDP growth rate of Emilia-Romagna, the mostly affected region. Using a difference-in-differences approach and a coincident indicator of monthly economic cycle, we estimate a 0.2 percentage points reduction of economic growth rate.