Suchergebnisse

Abstract. ."Italy in a European context" moved from a current research project of the EuroSapienza Research Center's. The book adopts a multidisciplinary standpoint. Each single chapter investigates the role of Italy in pursuing the EU five targets by 2020 that are: the increase both of employment level and of R&D/ innovation expenditures, the energetic measures of climate change, the reduction of school drop-out rate and the counter actions against poverty and social exclusion. This work is divided into nine chapters and two sections. The first section is based on four chapters whose objective is to investigate EU economic policies and aspects that concern political and social inequality. The second section is based on five chapters whose objective is to investigate EU economic policies and aspects concerning business and environment.Keywords. Economic History, Monetary Policy, Environmental Economics, Political Economy, Business, Management.JEL. E40, N20, O21, M20, M30.

AbstractDespite a long settlement history, empirical investigations of the role of path dependency in the long-term evolution of human populations are scarce in Europe, and especially in the Mediterranean countries. Using spatially explicit econometric techniques, our study discusses the empirical evidence stemming from a quantitative analysis of the spatial distribution of population growth rates in 115 districts of metropolitan Athens (Greece) over one century, distinguishing path dependency from the impact of other socio-economic forces on long-term urban expansion. The empirical findings of this study clarify how path-dependent regulation of population growth was heterogeneous over time and space, and depends on the specific stage of the city life cycle. After an initial period when path-independent population expansion reflected the inherent impact of exogenous shocks, path-dependent growth was associated with compact urbanization governed by agglomeration and scale advantages. Path-dependent growth was less intense during suburbanization, when the population spread over larger areas.

Are Italy's primary-surplus policies compatible with the sustainability of government debt? We address the question by examining historical budget data in post-unification Italy, over the 150 years from 1862 to 2012. Controlling for temporary output, temporary spending and world war-time periods in assessing whether primary surpluses significantly reacted to changes in debt, we find the following results: (i) the hypothesis of nonlinearity in the surplus-debt relationship significantly outperforms the hypothesis of linearity; (ii) there exists a threshold level in the debt-GDP ratio, approximately equal to 111%, above which Italian fiscal policy makers are concerned with corrective actions to avoid insolvency; (iii) the robustly positive reaction of primary surpluses to debt beyond the trigger point ensures fiscal sustainability.

Are Italy's primary-surplus policies compatible with the sustainability of government debt? We address the question by examining historical budget data in post-unification Italy, over the 150 years from 1862 to 2012. Controlling for temporary output, temporary spending and world war-time periods in assessing whether primary surpluses significantly reacted to changes in debt, we find the following results: (i) the hypothesis of nonlinearity in the surplus-debt relationship significantly outperforms the hypothesis of linearity; (ii) there exists a threshold level in the debt-GDP ratio, approximately equal to 111%, above which Italian fiscal policy makers are concerned with corrective actions to avoid insolvency; (iii) the robustly positive reaction of primary surpluses to debt beyond the trigger point ensures fiscal sustainability.