Scicchitano, Sergio

Profile Picture
Institutional profile
Professor Scicchitano is an applied economist and Senior Researcher at the National Institute for Public Policies Analysis – INAPP (currently on unpaid leave) in Rome, Italy. He obtained the Italian National Scientific Qualification for the role of Associate Professor in Economic Policy, and in 2022 he won the Kuznets Prize. He is the coordinator of the “Italian” group of research and of the “Coronavirus” thematic group of research at the Global Labor Organization (GLO). He is also Section Editor for "Covid-19" in the 2022 Handbook of Labor, Human Resources and Population Economics, Springer eds. Professor Scicchitano is Associate Editor for the Eurasian Economic Review (EAER), ed. Springer and Member of the Editorial Board for Economies and European Scientific Journal (ESJ). He is currently involved in many international research projects.

Filters

2022 - 202523
Reset filters

Settings

Citations

Publication Search Results

Now showing 1 - 10 of 23
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Publication
    Even more discouraged? The NEET generation at the age of COVID-19
    (2024) Aina, Carmen; Brunetti, Irene; Mussida, Chiara; Scicchitano, Sergio
    The Not in Education, Employment or Training (NEET) status is a long-standing problem that occupies a priority role in the European policy agenda, even more during the post-COVID-19 outbreak. This paper investigates whether and how the COVID-19 pandemic and the quality of institutions affect the probability of being NEET in Italy. In treating the 15–34 unemployed and inactive cohort jointly, our hypothesis is that the COVID-19 exposure has increased the risk of being NEET during the second quarter of 2020 whereas the quality of institutions could mitigate it. Estimates on a unique dataset obtained by merging the Italian Labor Force Survey with the Institutional Quality Index dataset, confirms it. In addition, in dealing the 15–24 and 25–34 cohorts separately, our results show that individuals in the older age group are the most affected. Finally, “good deeds” implemented by institutions, such as active policies conducted at regional level, are a further educational investment that could protect from becoming NEET.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Publication
    The call of nature. Three post-pandemic scenarios about remote working in Milan
    (Elsevier, 2024) Biagetti, Marco; Croce, Giuseppe; Mariotti, Ilaria; Rossi, Federica; Scicchitano, Sergio
    In recent years remote working (RW) arrangements have increased in many countries, mainly because of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has also intensified the need for humans to live closer to nature. Within this context, the paper aims to discuss three possible future scenarios for the spread of RW by 2050, and how this could affect residential choices, people's relationship with the natural environment, and thus the renewed role of large cities, small towns, and areas close to nature. A specific focus is placed on the city of Milan in northwest Italy. To give empirical foundations to our scenarios, we analyzed data for the year 2021. The first scenario we consider (the Gentrified City) implies the risk that Milan will become a gentrified city, thus pushing social and economic inequality. However, on the contrary, our data suggest that in Italy a potential pool of workers would leave the city and move to a small town or closer to nature if allowed to work remotely. This trend could lead to the second scenario (the Doughnut City), but data for Milan show that the share of those willing to leave Milan is lower than the national average, which can be explained by the good quality of offered services; thus, the city center is unlikely to empty due to RW. The desirable option would be represented by the third scenario: some remote workers move to intermediary cities (the Intermediary Cities scenario), reducing territorial disparities.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Publication
    Does Working from Home Increase the Gender Wage Gap? Insights from an Italian Survey of Occupations
    (2024) Bonacini, Luca; Gallo, Giovanni; Scicchitano, Sergio
    This article investigates to what extent the working from home (WFH) feasibility of occupations can influence the gender wag gap (GWG) at the mean and along the wage distribution. Based on Oaxaca–Blinder decompositions and unconditional quantile regressions, results show that the GWG is greater among women working in an occupation with a high level of WFH feasibility. We find evidence of both sticky floor and glass ceiling effects for employees with high WFH feasibility and only a sticky floor effect for the group with low WFH feasibility. The positive association revealed between the level of WFH feasibility and the GWG appears particularly strong among older and married women employees. These results underscore that the WFH feasibility may play an important role in exacerbating future gender gaps in wages, as WFH is expected to remain a normal practice beyond the COVID-19 pandemic.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Publication
    Britain and BrExit: Is the UK more attractive tosupervisors? An analysis of the wage premiumto supervision across the EU
    (2022) Leonida, Leone; Giangreco, Antonio; Scicchitano, Sergio; Biagetti, Marco
    We studied which European Union (EU) economy was more attractive prior to Brexit for employees in supervisory positions. We estimate the extra wage that supervisors earn relative to their subordinates—the wage premium to supervision (WPS)—at different quantiles of distribution of wages for 26 European economies. We find that the UK rewards supervisors more than other EU economies. Moreover, the WPS increases with wage and so increases wage inequality. Over 10% of the WPS depends on the national economic context. We discuss the implications for immigration and policymakers in relation to the post-Brexit process.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Publication
    Drivers of skill mismatch among Italian graduates: the role of personality traits
    (2023) Esposito, Piero; Scicchitano, Sergio
    It is now well accepted that human capital is a heterogeneous aggregate and that noncognitive skills are at least as relevant as cognitive abilities. In spite of this growing interest in the labour market consequences of personality traits, the relationship between these and educational and skill mismatch is scant. In this paper, we investigate the impact of the five main personality traits (Big 5) on educational and skill mismatch in Italian graduates. To this aim, we use the 2018 wave of the INAPP-PLUS survey, which contains information on skill mismatch, on the Big 5 personality traits, and on a large number of other individual and job-specific characteristics. The empirical analysis takes into account both demand and supply variables mediating the effect of personality on skill mismatch and controls for non-random selection into employment and tertiary education. We find that some personality traits reduce the probability of overeducation, suggesting complementarity between cognitive and noncognitive skills. In addition, we find a positive effect of conscientiousness on both overeducation and overqualification. The evidence regarding job satisfaction suggests that individuals with high scores for conscientiousness voluntarily decide to be mismatched when this entails higher satisfaction in other dimensions of the job.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Publication
    Do informal Networks Increase Migrants’ Over-Education? Comparing Over-Education for Natives, Migrants and Second Generations in Italy and Assessing the Role of Networks in Generating It
    (Springer Nature, 2023) Van Wolleghem, Pierre Georges; De Angelis, Marina; Scicchitano, Sergio
    Whilst migration has become a structural feature of most European countries, the integration of foreigners in the labour market continues to raise concerns. Evidence across countries shows that migrants are more often over-educated than natives. Over the last few years, scholarship has intended to capture the effect of informal networks on migrants’ over-education. Interestingly, no study has looked into the Italian case, a country for which the effect of networks on education-occupation mismatch is well documented. This article has two objectives: it assesses the extent to which over-education affects migrants and it evaluates the role informal networks play in producing it. We find that migrants have a higher probability of being over-educated than natives and second-generation migrants. Likewise, we find little evidence of a differentiated effect of networks as they tend to increase migrants’ over-education whilst decreasing it for natives and second-generation migrants. Empirical evidence is drawn from the application of causal inference modelling to PLUS 2018—Participation, Labour, Unemployment Survey.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Publication
    The reassuring effect of firms' technological innovations on workers' job insecurity
    (2024) Caselli, Mauro; Fracasso, Andrea; Marcolin, Arianna; Scicchitano, Sergio
    Purpose This work analyses how the adoption of technological innovations correlates with workers' perceived levels of job insecurity, and what factors moderate such relationship. Design/methodology/approach The study makes use of the 2018 wave of the Participation, Labour, Unemployment Survey (PLUS) from Inapp. The richness of the survey and the representativeness of the underlying sample (including 13,837 employed workers) allow employing various empirical specifications where it is possible to control and moderate for many socio-demographic features of the worker, including her occupation and industry of employment, thereby accounting for various potential confounding factors. Findings The results of this ordered logit estimations show that workers' perception of job insecurity is affected by many subjective, firm-related and even macroeconomic factors. This study demonstrates that the adoption of technological innovations by companies is associated with lower levels of job insecurity perceived by their workers. In fact, the adoption of technological innovations by a company is perceived by surviving workers (those who remain in the same firm even after the introduction of such innovations) as a signal of the firm's health and its commitment to preserving the activity. Individual- and occupation-specific moderating factors play a limited role. Originality/value This study estimates how perceived job insecurity relates to the technological innovations adopted by the firms in which the interviewees are employed rather than analyzing their general concerns about job insecurity. In addition, this study identifies different types of innovations, such as product and process innovation, automation and other types of innovations.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Publication
    The role of natural resources, fintech, political stability, and social globalization in environmental sustainability: Evidence from the United Kingdom
    (Elsevier, 2024) Andlib, Zubaria; Scicchitano, Sergio; Padda, Ihtsham Ul Haq
    Numerous studies illustrate that natural resources, financial technologies, social globalization, and political stability are essential factors that influence environmental sustainability. Therefore, researchers in developed nations must explore these interconnections further, mainly when these nations focus on achieving net zero emissions targets. The present analysis illuminates the connotations among natural resources, political stability, fintech, social globalization, and CO2 emissions in the UK. The current analysis has taken the time frame, 2000Q1 to 2021Q4, and employed the latest approach, i.e., the bootstrap ARDL technique, for estimation. The empirical results revealed that natural resources and social globalization are escalating CO2 emissions. Nonetheless, political stability and fintech lead to decreased CO2 emissions in the specific case of the selected developed nation. The present analysis confabulates an uni-directional connotation between all the chosen economic indicators and environmental degradation in the UK. As per the observed empirical outcomes, developed nations must initiate policies and programs to utilize natural resources efficiently without compromising environmental sustainability. In addition, governments in developed nations should encourage financial technologies and political stability to promote ecological sustainability.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Publication
    Distributional effects of COVID-19
    (Springer Nature, 2023) Aina, Carmen; Brunetti, Irene; Mussida, Chiara; Scicchitano, Sergio
    Using Italian Labour Force Survey data for the period 2019Q1-2020Q4 and applying quantile regression model accounting for sample selection bias, the paper investigates the effects of the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic on the wage distribution of employees, exploiting differences across sectors and by working from home arrangement. The findings reveal that the pandemic seems to positively affect wages of the entire workforce. However, this short-term advantage might be temporary as potentially driven by occupational changes in employment composition, whereas teleworking arrangement entails a wage premium for all workers. Low paid workers, employed in hotel/restaurant sector and not teleworking during the outbreak, face a reduction in wages (− 13.7%), while employees of public administration and education sectors exhibit a wage premium. When considering the joint effect of COVID-19 and working from home arrangement, estimates show that, despite few exceptions, wages of teleworking employees have been not affected by the coronavirus. Finally, we also control for self-selection issue by implementing the inverse probability weighting estimator.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Publication
    Technological Innovations and Workers’ Job Insecurity: The Moderating Role of Firm Strategies
    (2023) Caselli, Mauro; Fracasso, Andrea; Marcolin, Arianna; Scicchitano, Sergio
    In this paper, we empirically assess whether the perceived implications of technological innovations on the probability of job loss vary according to the innovation-related strategies adopted by firms. We take advantage of a unique dataset based on a large and representative crosssectional survey covering several characteristics of Italian workers and their firms. We find that the relationship between technological innovations and job insecurity is moderated by firms’ technology-specific training programs, their dismissal plans, and the impact of innovations on the tasks and activities performed by workers. Thus, workers perceptions of job insecurity vary significantly across innovative firms and the adoption of technological innovations in the workplace has a multifaceted impact on the perceptions of job insecurity of the affected workers.