THE ESTIMATION OF HUMAN CAPITAL BY ADMINISTRATIVE ARCHIVES IN A STATIC AND LONGITUDINAL PERSPECTIVE: THE CASE OF MILAN

Abstract This paper focuses on the estimation of the latent variable human capital (HC) at disaggregated level (worker) by available routinely institutional data flows. In particular we utilize the Lombardy region administrative archive ‘Employment Centers of the Province of Milan’, collecting information about careers of workers in the private sector of the Milan area, and administrative flows collecting mandatory workers' individual income tax returns, filed with the National Internal Revenue Service. First, we propose and empirically estimate HC scores in a static (referred to 2004) framework, by means of a realistic measurement model within causal relationships among endogenous and exogenous (investment) HC indicators. Furthermore, the model also specifies a set of (concomitant) indicators that, not belonging to HC investment indicators, have causal impact on endogenous variables and on HC scores, too. Second, we propose a longitudinal analysis (period 2000–2004) aimed to investigate how workers' earned income growth rates vary over workers' educational levels and other personal characteristics. The empirical results of both analyses confirm the characteristics of the Italian job market, denoted by marked inequalities, and knowledge regarding the process of school to work transition, characterized by a weak incidence of education on longitudinal trajectories of earned income.     

Resource abundance, growth and welfare: A Schumpeterian perspective

This paper takes a new look at the long-run implications of resource abundance. It develops a Schumpeterian model of endogenous growth that incorporates an upstream resource-intensive sector and yields an analytical solution for the transition path. It then derives conditions under which, as the economy's endowment of a natural resource rises, (i) growth accelerates and welfare rises, (ii) growth decelerates but welfare rises nevertheless, and (iii) growth decelerates and welfare falls. Which of these scenarios prevails depends on the response of the natural resource price to an increase in the resource endowment. The price response determines the change in income earned by the owners of the resource (the households) and thereby the change in their expenditure on manufacturing goods. Since manufacturing is the economy's innovative sector, this income-to-expenditure effect links resource abundance to the size of the market for manufacturing goods and drives how re-source abundance affects incentives to undertake innovative activity.     

Economic Risk and Political Risk in Fiscal Unions

A fiscal programme that redistributes income from rich to poor individuals indirectly redistributes tax revenues from regions hit by a favourable shock to regions hit by an unfavourable one. Centralised fiscal redistribution has therefore been advocated as a way to insure individuals against region-specific shocks. In this paper, we argue that a centralised fiscal policy, while reducing the uncertainty on the tax base, may create additional uncertainty on the tax rate. Using a simple model we show that the higher uncertainty on the policy instrument might more than offset the lower uncertainty on the tax base.     

Model building and estimation strategies for implementing the Balanced Scorecard in Health sector

Over last two decades, the concept of the Balanced Scorecard has had broad application by the health sector internationally, including Hospitals systems and national healthcare systems or organizations. However, the lack of literature on causal-effect relationships between different types of dimensions and indicators poses difficulty in conceptualising and implementing a quality evaluation system based on Balanced Scorecard. Methodologically, the most natural context for Balanced Scorecard conceptualization and estimation deals with Structural Equation Models with latent variables. Partial Least Squares Path Modelling has found increased applications, thanks to its ability to handle complex models. However, the lack of a global optimization criterion makes it difficult to evaluate this procedure. The aim of this article is to propose a methodological conceptualization of the Balanced Scorecard in a new context, as the Health sector, using a suitable statistical approach to estimate causal relationships among specified latent dimensions, together with a model building strategy, a necessary step when expert knowledge is too weak to build a robust and well suited model. Specifically, within the Structural Equation Models framework a two-step model building strategy is presented; the first step build the measurement models based on a clustering (around latent variables) technique and the second step build the structural model based on partial correlations and a procedure that selects the best model in terms of predictive power, measured by the mean of the R ² for the endogenous latent variables. Finally, an application based on administrative archives of Lombardy region (Italy) illustrates the presented methodology.     

Resourceful Sensemaking: Overcoming Barriers between Marketing and Design in NPD

New product development (NPD) success depends on the capacity of different functions to effectively collaborate. In particular, while recent studies have highlighted the importance of marketing and design working together, research suggests this relationship is often fraught with conflict due to different “thought worlds.” However, empirical research also identifies that the solution lies not in reducing the psychological distance between the two functions, but in the sensemaking practices used by designers and marketers to expand each other's understanding of the potential NPD solution. This process is known as resourceful sensemaking, and it refers to practitioners’ capacity to transform knowledge with the aim of expanding each other's horizons to ensure better team outcomes. Drawing on 71 interviews with designers and marketers in Australia and New Zealand, we examine how each function strategically deploys knowledge of the other to improve NPD outcomes. Building on the sensemaking literature, we demonstrate that while still drawing on different thought worlds, the inputs of both designers and marketers are necessary for effective NPD. We also identify that both are capable of creating a common framework of meaning through three resourceful sensemaking practices: exposing, co‐opting, and repurposing. Moreover, we identify the need for resourceful sensemaking that results in horizon‐expanding discourse among those involved in NPD. These practices are found to enable marketers and designers to expand the range of considerations and inputs into NPD; help organizations reconcile either/or dualisms; and lead them to identify unmet consumer needs, which result in the creation of innovative products. This paper thereby advances understanding of interfunctional coordination in NPD, integration of design into NPD, and sensemaking more broadly.     

Corporate taxes, growth and welfare in a Schumpeterian economy

I take a new look at the long-run implications of taxation through the lens of modern Schumpeterian growth theory. I focus on the latest vintage of models that sterilize the scale effect through a process of product proliferation that fragments the aggregate market into submarkets whose size does not increase with the size of the workforce. I show that the following interventions raise welfare: (a) granting full expensibility of R&D to incorporated firms; (b) eliminating the corporate income tax and/or the capital gains tax; (c) reducing taxes on labor and/or consumption. What makes these results remarkable is that in all three cases the endogenous increase in the tax on dividends necessary to balance the budget has a positive effect on growth. A general implication of my analysis is that corporate taxation plays a special role in Schumpeterian economies and provides novel insights on how to design welfare-enhancing tax reforms.     

Industry and the Family: Two Engines of Growth

We generalize the class of endogenous growth models in which the scale of the economy has level rather than growth effects, and study the implications of different demographic and technological factors when both fertility choice and research effort are endogenous. The model incorporates two dimensions of technological progress: vertical (quality of goods) and horizontal (variety of goods). Both dimensions contribute to productivity growth but are driven by different processes and hence respond differently to changes in fundamentals. Specifically, while unbounded vertical progress is feasible, the scale of the economy limits the variety of goods. Incorporating a linearity in reproduction generates steady-state population growth and variety expansion. We thus have two engines of growth generating dynamics that we compare with observed changes in demographics, market structure, and patterns of growth. Numerical solutions yield the important insight that, while endogenous, fertility responds very little to industrial policies. Demographic shocks, in contrast, have substantial effects on growth.     

Order aggressiveness as a metric to assess the usefulness of accounting information

Motivated by the availability of high-frequency data on trading activity, this paper proposes the use of order aggressiveness as a metric to evaluate the usefulness of accounting information. I test, through an analysis of order aggressiveness, whether earnings announcements of firms listed on the Italian Stock Exchange limit order book have information content. I estimate an ordered probit relating order aggressiveness to unexpected earnings and to three market determinants of aggressiveness. Consistent with the theory on the choice between limit and market orders, I find that order aggressiveness increases with the absolute value of unexpected earnings. The results provide evidence on the extent to which the information contained in earnings is used by traders.     

The determinants of whistleblowing in public administrations: an analysis conducted in Italian health organizations,universities, and municipalities

The aim of this paper is to examine which variables are most important in encouraging whistleblowing in Italian public administrations, as a result of the compulsory application of the anti-corruption Law No. 190/2012. Our research is based on an empirical analysis of 365 public administrations: 86 hospitals, 137 health agencies, 39 universities, and 103 major Italian municipalities.

The results show that whistleblowing seems to occur more frequently in large public administrations, to be associated with formal procedures and an organizational proceduralization that encourages individuals to actually blow the whistle, and that it is only partially correlated to training and education.     

Postponement Strategies for Global Downstream Supply Chains: A Conceptual Framework

Postponement is a well-known organizational concept and usually relates to the deferment in time of manufacturing and/or logistics operations. In the current global competitive landscape, situations where postponement can be applied are rapidly increasing. Faced with the wide range of customs duties and free-trade agreements currently in place, companies need to (re)design their postponement strategies to customize their products appropriately, and to the proper degree, in each market. As the actual location where operations take place has a major impact on a company’s overall performance, the spatial perspective must also be taken into account when designing global postponement strategies, alongside the conventional temporal perspective. Heretofore, the academic literature does not offer any comprehensive framework on a global scale either for handling what is known as the postponement boundary problem, or for conceptualizing the related postponement strategies. Building on previous research, the aim of the present study was to investigate the postponement concept in a global environment with a downstream focus. The intended purpose is twofold: first, to review and expand previous studies on the subject and, second, to provide some guidelines for conceptualizing global postponement strategies. A structured literature review was first conducted, followed by the development of a framework that combines both the temporal and the spatial dimensions. Finally, the framework was applied to a group of 28 business cases taken from the literature, to act as a bridge between academic theories and practitioners’ current business operations.