IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jregsc/v60y2020i5p878-902.html

A new phoenix? Large plants regeneration policies in Italy

Author

Listed:
  • Antonio Accetturo
  • Giuseppe Albanese
  • Alessio D'Ignazio

Abstract

The fall of employment in manufacturing that the world's most advanced economies have been experiencing in the past 40 years has triggered a number of policies, undertaken in several countries. In this paper, we evaluate the effectiveness of a place‐based policy, carried out in Italy, aimed at both generating private investments and increasing employment in areas affected by deep industrial decline. By means of an instrumental variable identification strategy, we show that the program has been largely unsuccessful.

Suggested Citation

  • Antonio Accetturo & Giuseppe Albanese & Alessio D'Ignazio, 2020. "A new phoenix? Large plants regeneration policies in Italy," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(5), pages 878-902, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jregsc:v:60:y:2020:i:5:p:878-902
    DOI: 10.1111/jors.12487
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/jors.12487
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/jors.12487?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Neumark, David & Kolko, Jed, 2010. "Do enterprise zones create jobs? Evidence from California's enterprise zone program," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 1-19, July.
    2. Bracco, Emanuele & Lockwood, Ben & Porcelli, Francesco & Redoano, Michela, 2015. "Intergovernmental grants as signals and the alignment effect: Theory and evidence," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 78-91.
    3. Crozet, Matthieu & Mayer, Thierry & Mucchielli, Jean-Louis, 2004. "How do firms agglomerate? A study of FDI in France," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 27-54, January.
    4. Jed Kolko & David Neumark, 2010. "Do some enterprise zones create jobs?," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(1), pages 5-38.
    5. Fernando Ferreira & Joseph Gyourko, 2009. "Do Political Parties Matter? Evidence from U.S. Cities," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(1), pages 399-422.
    6. Chiara Criscuolo & Ralf Martin & Henry G. Overman & John Van Reenen, 2019. "Some Causal Effects of an Industrial Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 109(1), pages 48-85, January.
    7. Osterloh, Steffen, 2012. "Words speak louder than actions: The impact of politics on economic performance," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(3), pages 318-336.
    8. Enrico Moretti, 2010. "Local Multipliers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(2), pages 373-377, May.
    9. Raffaello Bronzini & Guido de Blasio & Guido Pellegrini & Alessandro Scognamiglio, 2008. "The effect of investment tax credit: Evidence from an atypical programme in Italy," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 661, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    10. Benjamin Austin & Edward Glaeser & Lawrence Summers, 2018. "Jobs for the Heartland: Place-Based Policies in 21st-Century America," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 49(1 (Spring), pages 151-255.
    11. Augusto Cerqua & Guido Pellegrini, 2017. "Industrial policy evaluation in the presence of spillovers," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 49(3), pages 671-686, October.
    12. Simona Iammarino & Andrés Rodriguez-Pose & Michael Storper, 2019. "Regional inequality in Europe: evidence, theory and policy implications," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 19(2), pages 273-298.
    13. Philip Du Caju & Erwan Gautier & Daphne Momferatu & Melanie Ward-Warmedinger, 2009. "Institutional Features of Wage Bargaining in 23 European Countries, the US and Japan," Ekonomia, Cyprus Economic Society and University of Cyprus, vol. 12(2), pages 57-108, Winter.
    14. Annamaria Nifo & Gaetano Vecchione, 2014. "Do Institutions Play a Role in Skilled Migration? The Case of Italy," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(10), pages 1628-1649, October.
    15. Michael Greenstone & Richard Hornbeck & Enrico Moretti, 2010. "Identifying Agglomeration Spillovers: Evidence from Winners and Losers of Large Plant Openings," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 118(3), pages 536-598, June.
    16. Monica Andini & Guido de Blasio, 2016. "Local development that money cannot buy: Italy’s Contratti di Programma," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 16(2), pages 365-393.
    17. Antonio Accetturo, 2014. "Political selection in the skilled city," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 956, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    18. Leslie E. Papke, 1993. "What Do We Know about Enterprise Zones?," NBER Chapters, in: Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 7, pages 37-72, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Sascha O. Becker & Peter H. Egger & Maximilian von Ehrlich, 2013. "Absorptive Capacity and the Growth and Investment Effects of Regional Transfers: A Regression Discontinuity Design with Heterogeneous Treatment Effects," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 5(4), pages 29-77, November.
    20. Chaurey, Ritam, 2017. "Location-based tax incentives: Evidence from India," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 156(C), pages 101-120.
    21. Accetturo, Antonio & de Blasio, Guido, 2012. "Policies for local development: An evaluation of Italy's “Patti Territoriali”," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(1-2), pages 15-26.
    22. Frederico Finan & Maurizio Mazzocco, 2021. "Electoral Incentives and the Allocation of Public Funds," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(5), pages 2467-2512.
    23. Brollo, Fernanda & Nannicini, Tommaso, 2012. "Tying Your Enemy's Hands in Close Races: The Politics of Federal Transfers in Brazil," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 106(4), pages 742-761, November.
    24. Arulampalam, Wiji & Dasgupta, Sugato & Dhillon, Amrita & Dutta, Bhaskar, 2009. "Electoral goals and center-state transfers: A theoretical model and empirical evidence from India," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(1), pages 103-119, January.
    25. Becker, Sascha O. & Egger, Peter H. & von Ehrlich, Maximilian, 2012. "Too much of a good thing? On the growth effects of the EU's regional policy," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 56(4), pages 648-668.
    26. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/c8dmi8nm4pdjkuc9g8o118937 is not listed on IDEAS
    27. Hansjörg Blöchliger & David King, 2007. "Less than you thought: The fiscal autonomy of sub-central governments," OECD Economic Studies, OECD Publishing, vol. 2006(2), pages 155-188.
    28. Cuberes, David, 2011. "Sequential city growth: Empirical evidence," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(2), pages 229-239, March.
    29. Marianne Bertrand & Esther Duflo & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2004. "How Much Should We Trust Differences-In-Differences Estimates?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 119(1), pages 249-275.
    30. Matias Busso & Jesse Gregory & Patrick Kline, 2013. "Assessing the Incidence and Efficiency of a Prominent Place Based Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(2), pages 897-947, April.
    31. Harrington, Joseph E, Jr, 1993. "Economic Policy, Economic Performance, and Elections," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(1), pages 27-42, March.
    32. Bronzini, Raffaello & de Blasio, Guido, 2006. "Evaluating the impact of investment incentives: The case of Italy's Law 488/1992," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 327-349, September.
    33. Hanson, Andrew, 2009. "Local employment, poverty, and property value effects of geographically-targeted tax incentives: An instrumental variables approach," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(6), pages 721-731, November.
    34. Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), 2015. "Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 5, number 5.
    35. Luca, Davide, 2016. "Votes and Regional Economic Growth: Evidence from Turkey," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 477-495.
    36. Marco Manacorda & Edward Miguel & Andrea Vigorito, 2011. "Government Transfers and Political Support," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 3(3), pages 1-28, July.
    37. Devereux, Michael P. & Griffith, Rachel & Simpson, Helen, 2007. "Firm location decisions, regional grants and agglomeration externalities," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(3-4), pages 413-435, April.
    38. Piotr Ciżkowicz & Magda Ciżkowicz-Pękała & Piotr Pękała & Andrzej Rzońca, 2017. "The effects of special economic zones on employment and investment: a spatial panel modeling perspective," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 17(3), pages 571-605.
    39. Becker, Sascha O. & Egger, Peter H. & von Ehrlich, Maximilian, 2010. "Going NUTS: The effect of EU Structural Funds on regional performance," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(9-10), pages 578-590, October.
    40. Levitt, Steven D & Snyder, James M, Jr, 1997. "The Impact of Federal Spending on House Election Outcomes," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(1), pages 30-53, February.
    41. Baum-Snow, Nathaniel & Ferreira, Fernando, 2015. "Causal Inference in Urban and Regional Economics," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 3-68, Elsevier.
    42. Givord, Pauline & Rathelot, Roland & Sillard, Patrick, 2013. "Place-based tax exemptions and displacement effects: An evaluation of the Zones Franches Urbaines program," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 151-163.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Giuseppe Albanese & Guglielmo Barone & Guido de Blasio, 2023. "The impact of place‐based policies on interpersonal income inequality," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 90(358), pages 508-530, April.
    2. Giuseppe Albanese & Guglielmo Barone & Guido DeBlasio, 2021. "The impact of place-based policies on income distribution," Discussion Paper series in Regional Science & Economic Geography 2021-04, Gran Sasso Science Institute, Social Sciences, revised Mar 2021.
    3. Cerqua, Augusto & Pellegrini, Guido, 2022. "Decomposing the employment effects of investment subsidies," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Neumark, David & Simpson, Helen, 2015. "Place-Based Policies," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 1197-1287, Elsevier.
    2. Giuseppe Albanese & Guido de Blasio & Andrea Locatelli, 2021. "Does EU regional policy promote local TFP growth? Evidence from the Italian Mezzogiorno," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 100(2), pages 327-348, April.
    3. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/3l4arseauo82kr3cm0qr8uihmg is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Ramboer, Sander & Reynaerts, Jo, 2020. "Indecent proposals: Estimating the impact of regional state aid through EU guideline compliance," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    5. Chaurey, Ritam & Le, Duong Trung, 2018. "Infrastructure Grants and the Performance of Microenterprises," IZA Discussion Papers 11749, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Binkai Chen & Ming Lu & Christopher Timmins & Kuanhu Xiang, 2019. "Spatial Misallocation: Evaluating Place-Based Policies Using a Natural Experiment in China," NBER Working Papers 26148, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Augusto Cerqua & Guido Pellegrini, 2020. "Labor mobility effects of a firm-level shock," Working Papers 1/20, Sapienza University of Rome, DISS.
    8. Thierry Mayer & Florian Mayneris & Loriane Py, 2017. "The impact of Urban Enterprise Zones on establishment location decisions and labor market outcomes: evidence from France," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 17(4), pages 709-752.
    9. Gibbons, Stephen & Overman, Henry & Sarvimäki, Matti, 2021. "The local economic impacts of regeneration projects: Evidence from UK's single regeneration budget," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    10. Jofre-Monseny, Jordi, 2014. "The effects of unemployment protection on migration in lagging regions," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 73-86.
    11. Thierry Mayer & Florian Mayneris & Loriane Py, 2017. "The impact of Urban Enterprise Zones on establishment location decisions and labor market outcomes: evidence from France," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 17(4), pages 709-752.
    12. Maximilian v. Ehrlich & Henry G. Overman, 2020. "Place-Based Policies and Spatial Disparities across European Cities," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 34(3), pages 128-149, Summer.
    13. Brachert, Matthias & Dettmann, Eva & Titze, Mirko, 2019. "The regional effects of a place-based policy – Causal evidence from Germany," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    14. Ku, Hyejin & Schönberg, Uta & Schreiner, Ragnhild C., 2020. "Do place-based tax incentives create jobs?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 191(C).
    15. Nathaniel Lane, 2020. "The New Empirics of Industrial Policy," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 20(2), pages 209-234, June.
    16. Giuseppe Albanese & Guglielmo Barone & Guido DeBlasio, 2021. "The impact of place-based policies on income distribution," Discussion Paper series in Regional Science & Economic Geography 2021-04, Gran Sasso Science Institute, Social Sciences, revised Mar 2021.
    17. Lerche, Adrian, 2019. "Investment Tax Credits and the Response of Firms," VfS Annual Conference 2019 (Leipzig): 30 Years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall - Democracy and Market Economy 203526, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    18. Cerqua, Augusto & Pellegrini, Guido, 2022. "Decomposing the employment effects of investment subsidies," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).
    19. Dettmann, Eva & Weyh, Antje & Titze, Mirko, 2017. "Who benefits from GRW? Heterogeneous effects of investment subsidies in Saxony Anhalt," VfS Annual Conference 2017 (Vienna): Alternative Structures for Money and Banking 168158, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    20. Thierry MAYER & Florian MAYNERIS & Loriane PY, 2012. "The Impact of Urban Enterprise Zones on Establishments' Location Decisions: Evidence from French ZFUs," LIDAM Discussion Papers IRES 2012019, Université catholique de Louvain, Institut de Recherches Economiques et Sociales (IRES).
    21. Hasan, Rana & Jiang, Yi & Rafols, Radine Michelle, 2021. "Place-based preferential tax policy and industrial development: Evidence from India’s program on industrially backward districts," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 150(C).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jregsc:v:60:y:2020:i:5:p:878-902. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0022-4146 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.