Papers by claudia villosio
L’immigrazione di lavoratori stranieri e dei loro familiari verso l’Italia ha conosciuto nel cors... more L’immigrazione di lavoratori stranieri e dei loro familiari verso l’Italia ha conosciuto nel corso dell’ultimo decennio ritmi di crescita consistenti, simili a quelli osservati in altri paesi europei quali la Spagna e la Gran Bretagna. Tuttavia, a differenza di quanto osservato altrove, la crescita dell’immigrazione in Italia non è stata accompagnata da una corrispondente crescita economica: nel corso del periodo considerato, l’Italia ha mostrato capacità di crescita ben inferiore a quella osservata in precedenza e alla media degli altri paesi europei. Quali interpretazioni si possono avanzare per questo apparente paradosso di un’immigrazione massiccia senza crescita economica significativa? La tesi che proponiamo in questo articolo è che il modello migratorio italiano sia stato a lungo improntato ad un’immigrazione “low cost”. La crescita della popolazione straniera nel nostro paese si è infatti realizzata grazie a costi economici e sociali ridotti per molti degli attori coinvolti dal fenomeno: i lavoratori nativi, il sistema delle imprese, il welfare state e le amministrazioni pubbliche, tra gli altri. L’attuale crisi economica fa però apparire i primi segnali di indebolimento di questo modello, provocando ad esempio costi crescenti in termini di maggiore concorrenzialità tra lavoratori italiani e stranieri o per il sistema di welfare pubblico. Le politiche di immigrazione potranno dunque subire importanti trasformazioni nel prossimo futuro, in direzione di una maggiore selettività e qualificazione dei migranti ammessi nel nostro paese per motivi economici. In una prima sezione si porterà in evidenza il paradosso tutto italiano dell’immigrazione senza crescita. Nella seconda sezione si svilupperà l’argomento dell’immigrazione “low cost” come possibile spiegazione del paradosso, identificando le principali dimensioni del fenomeno: nel mercato del lavoro, nel sistema produttivo e imprenditoriale, nel welfare pubblico e nell’amministrazione statale. Passeremo poi a identificare i segnali di indebolimento di questo modello e, in una quarta ed ultima sezione, le possibili direttrici di un modello alternativo, dove a costi crescenti si potrebbero associare anche maggiori benefici.
According to the aims of the labour market reforms of the 90s implemented in many European countr... more According to the aims of the labour market reforms of the 90s implemented in many European countries, workers may stay at their first job for a shorter time, but should be able to switch jobs easily. This would generate a trade-off between job opportunities and job stability. This paper addresses this issue using administrative longitudinal data for Germany and Italy, taken as representative examples of continuous and isolated reforms, respectively. The estimated piecewise constant job and employment duration models show that changes in the durations of the first job and employment -measured as the sum of multiple consecutive jobs -are observed in periods of labour market reforms. However, the existence of a trade-off is not confirmed by the results. In Germany, men have experienced an increase in employment stability over time, mated with somewhat longer job durations, while women have not benefitted from an increase in employment durations as a compensation for the marked decrease in their first job durations. In Italy, employment stability of the new entrants of both sexes has not improved after the reforms. The reduction in the duration of the first job has not been counterbalanced by an increase in the opportunity to find rapidly another job. These results suggest that the objective of increasing job opportunities by means of labour market deregulation has not been fully achieved. JEL: J62, J64, J68, K31, C41 -3 -another job and if this type of job mobility has become more common in the period analysed. Such an observation would indicate an increase in job opportunities over the period under study. As to the econometric technique, mixed proportional hazards models with constant time pieces and unobserved heterogeneity are employed for the analysis of job and employment durations.
Many European countries during the 1990s and early 2000s tried to raise labor market flexibility ... more Many European countries during the 1990s and early 2000s tried to raise labor market flexibility by relaxing their employment protection legislation. This paper investigates whether the reforms have influenced job and employment stability for labor market entrants in Germany and Italy. Duration models are estimated using comparable administrative data for the two countries. The results provide, to some extent, evidence of a decrease in job stability. However, this is not accompanied by a compensating increase in employment stability during the first 3 years after labor market entry.
This paper looks at short employment spells in three European countries: Great Britain, whose lab... more This paper looks at short employment spells in three European countries: Great Britain, whose labour market is considered the most flexible in the EU; Italy, regarded as the least flexible; and Germany, tightly regulated, but characterised by a deservedly famous apprenticeship system. In particular, it aims to assess whether young people in short-lived jobs stand a better chance of finding a 'good job' compared to their older colleagues. The increasingly held belief that -in modern economies -a 'bad job' at the beginning of one's career is the 'port-of-entry' to stable employment and to upward mobility, makes this assessment particularly relevant; ie it matters greatly if short-duration jobs are entry ports into better employment or become long term-traps. The lack of accepted benchmarks makes it difficult to reach strong conclusions in regard to the 'efficiency' of labour markets, however, this study should help to highlight the effect of different labour market institutions on mobility and on the soundness of the 'port-ofentry' hypothesis.
In this paper we investigate the relation between wage growth and labour mobility on a panel of I... more In this paper we investigate the relation between wage growth and labour mobility on a panel of Italian dependent workers observed between 1986 and 1991. We use an employer-employee linked panel of 30167 workers, built from Italian Social Security (INPS) administrative sources.
A key issue in increasing women's participation in productive activities is the possibility of ac... more A key issue in increasing women's participation in productive activities is the possibility of achieving a high work-life balance, both in terms of personal wellbeing and in terms of fair career prospects. The crucial event that challenges any level of work-life balance working women achieve is motherhood. We analyse how motherhood affects women's working career, both in terms of participation and in terms of wages, compared to "non-mothers". The country chosen for the analysis is Italy, a paradigmatic example of low participation rate, scant childcare, high wage inequality and a cultural environment that considers childcare a predominantly "female affair". While most of the literature focuses either on wages or on participation, we consider both dimensions in a country where female participation is low, thus contributing to filling the gap in the literature of studies of this kind referred to southern European countries. We confirm that the probability of leaving employment significantly increases for new mothers (career-break job penalty); however, this is mitigated by higher job quality and human capital endowment, and by childcare accessibility. Crucially, the availability of part-time jobs reduces the probability of mothers moving out of the labour force. Furthermore, women not leaving employment after becoming mothers face a decrease in wage levels and growth compared to non-mothers, and there are no signs of this gap closing five years after childbirth (family wage gap). Again, part-time employment plays a crucial role, as the family wage gap penalty emerges only among women working full-time both before and after childbirth; a part-time job over the whole period or even only after childbirth prevents any wage gap from opening up between such working mothers and non-mothers. A decisive fact in this context is that in Italy part-time jobs are (scant but) well paid and protected, unlike most other countries. JEL classification numbers: J13, J31
Many studies have been devoted to analyse the e¤ect of maternity on working mothers, considering ... more Many studies have been devoted to analyse the e¤ect of maternity on working mothers, considering both the career break job penalty and the e¤ect on wages. Most of these studies refer to countries where female participation to the labour market is high. On the contrary fewer studies consider Southern European countries, where the main concern is the low female employment rate. This paper aims at …lling the gap analysing the e¤ects of motherhood on women's working career in Italy, a neat example of Southern European country where female participation is increasing but still low, and where collective bargaining generates incresing but still low wage di¤erentials.
In this paper we investigate the relation between wage levels and growth, labour mobility and fir... more In this paper we investigate the relation between wage levels and growth, labour mobility and firm size among Italy's dependent workers between 1986 and 1991.
This paper looks at short employment spells in three European countries: the UK, whose labour mar... more This paper looks at short employment spells in three European countries: the UK, whose labour market is considered the most flexible in the EU; Italy, regarded as the least flexible; and Germany, tightly regulated, but characterised by a deservedly famous apprenticeship system. In particular, it aims to assess whether young people in short-lived jobs stand a better chance of finding a "good job" compared to their older colleagues. The increasingly held belief that -in modern economies -a "bad job" at the beginning of one's career is the "port-ofentry" to stable employment and to upward mobility, makes this assessment particularly relevant; i.e. it matters greatly if short-duration jobs are entry ports into better employment or become long term-traps. The lack of accepted benchmarks makes it difficult to reach strong conclusions in regard to the 'efficiency' of labour markets: cross-country comparisons help to highlight the effect of different labour market institutions on mobility and on the soundness of the "port-of-entry" hypothesis.
International Review of Applied Economics, 2011
In this paper, we use individual micro data on workers combined with industry and regional data t... more In this paper, we use individual micro data on workers combined with industry and regional data to study the wage dynamics of skilled and unskilled workers in Italy in the 1991–1998 period. In contrast to previous empirical studies, our data make it possible to analyse, within a single framework, the role of many of the factors indicated in the literature as possible determinants of skilled and unskilled wage dynamics: changes in the individual characteristics of workers, changes in labour market institutions, increasing international integration, and skill‐biased technological progress. Our results show that international integration, both in terms of trade in goods and in terms of international labour mobility, plays a role in determining the wage dynamics of skilled (white‐collar) and unskilled (blue‐collar) workers. Moreover, in line with labour economics research, our findings show that the individual characteristics of workers and the institutional variables are more relevant in explaining skilled and unskilled wage dynamics than wage differentials.
Labour, 1999
The paper analyses the impact of foreign workers on the Italian labour market. We address the iss... more The paper analyses the impact of foreign workers on the Italian labour market. We address the issue of whether immigrants from less developed countries are complementary or substitutes to domestic workers. We construct a data set on immigrant workers from the Administrative Social Security Archive which starts in 1986, before the general amnesty of 1990± 91, when a large share of illegal immigrants were granted working permits, and end in 1995. A two-stage procedure devised by Moulton is applied to yearly cross-sections of wages by industry and region. Our results show that the inflow of immigrants raises the wages of native manual workers (i.e. it has a complementary effect), and this effect is larger in small firms and in the north of the country. We postulate that the positive impact on native wages is due to the existence of labour constraints on the side of firms. Firms are unable to expand their output because they cannot find native workers who are willing to undertake certain (typically low-skilled) jobs. Immigrants help to fill this gap. This view is reinforced by the fact that over a`crucial threshold' of the share of foreign work (7.7 ± 12 percent) additional inflows in the labour market of foreign work have a negative effect on native wages (i.e. they compete with natives).
SSRN Electronic Journal, 1998
In many European countries the participation rates of older workers are worryingly low, and Italy... more In many European countries the participation rates of older workers are worryingly low, and Italywithin this picture -has one of the worst records, particularly for females. In this paper we investigate whether this signals an issue about their employability. Indeed, the non-participation of an individual does not point to an employability issue as long as it is a free choice of the person, and as long as it does not hinder their future participation in the labour market. To address this point we single out which are the empirically most relevant factors in shaping cross country differentials. Two selection processes emerged as having a most prominent role: the life cycle decision for women of not participating to the labour market, and the access for men and women to early retirement schemes. Controlling for these selection processes international differences reduce significantly. In both cases the main issue is the possibility that a participation choice made in a given point in time -for instance the early retirement decision -can have long lasting consequences, hindering future transition possibilities of the individuals. The magnitude of the two selection processes suggests already some policy conclusions, which are derived in the paper, and points to the need of further research to ascertain whether there are barriers to late entries and re-entries in the labour market.
In this paper we use individual micro data on workers combined with industry and regional data to... more In this paper we use individual micro data on workers combined with industry and regional data to study the wage dynamics of skilled and unskilled workers in Italy in the period 1991-1998. Being different to previous empirical studies, our data allow us to explore in a unique framework the role of many of the factors indicated in the literature as possible causes of the widening of the wage gap between skilled and unskilled workers: changes in the individual characteristics of workers, changes in the institutions of the labour market, increasing international integration and skill-biased technological progress. Our results show that international integration, both in terms of trade in goods and in terms of international labour mobility, plays a role in determining the wage dynamics of skilled (white collar) and of unskilled (blue collar) workers. In addition, in line with the research in labour economics, our findings show that the individual characteristics of workers, and the institutional variables matter more in explaining skilled and unskilled wage dynamics than differential wage one.
found that the impact of immigrants on the wage rates of natives was positive. This result has le... more found that the impact of immigrants on the wage rates of natives was positive. This result has led to the present paper which analyses the effect of immigrants on native employment.
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Papers by claudia villosio