Search results for " Italian firms"
showing 4 items of 4 documents
Banks, Firms and Economic Culture: Economists and Research Centres in Interwar Italy
2020
In the interwar years, Italy experimented a strong growth of applied economic research. The foundation of research centers can be read and placed in a much wider international trend that emerged during the Great War. In this essay, we offer a map of the most important research centers, exploring the extensive web of relationships between the academia and the productive world. We then focus on a set of case studies, selected for their relevance. Section 2 is devoted to the banking sector, with reference to four important cases (Banca Commerciale Italiana, Banca d’Italia, Associazione Bancaria Italiana and Banco di Sicilia); section 3 to the industrial sector (IRI, Finsider, Ansaldo, Edison, …
Estimating Verdoorn law for Italian firms and regions
2011
In empirical regional economics, returns to scale are typically estimated at the regional level in search for evidence on alternative theories of growth and agglomeration. However, returns to scale may also have a firm-level dimension. In this paper, we exploit micro level data and estimate the dynamic Verdoorn law in a multilevel-setting, where returns to scale are obtained simultaneously for the micro and the regional level. Using Italian firm-level data and the NUTS-3 level of aggregation, we estimate the classic and augmented versions of Verdoorn law for the manufacturing sector, and the rest of the economy for comparison. Our results show that increasing returns to scale co-exist at bo…
Agglomeration Externalities and the Productivity of Italian Firms
2015
Despite the richness of contributions on the effects of agglomeration on economic activity, the empirical evidence still falls short, especially at the microeconomic level, where they should matter the most. This paper adds to this literature by performing an empirical exploration of the role of Marshallian, Jacobian, and Porterian externalities for the productivity of Italian firms. In particular, a large dataset of small and medium enterprises is first employed to estimate firm-level total factor productivity (TFP). Then dynamic panel and instrumental variables estimation methods are used to assess the effects of agglomeration externalities. The findings seem to suggest that these effects…
Testing for convergence from the micro-level
2011
Empirical convergence analysis is typically envisaged from a macro aggregate perspective. However, researchers have recently highlighted how investigating convergence at the disaggregate level may yield interesting insights into the convergence debate. In this paper, we suggest an approach that allows exploiting large micro panels to test for convergence. Compared to the traditional convergence analysis, this approach allows obtaining beta- and sigma-like convergence parameters for both the micro and the macro level of interest. We provide a practical example that analyses productivity convergence across firms and provinces using a large sample of Italian firms.