Research
Work In Progress
Entrepreneurship and gentrification (with O. Sorenson)
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Abstract: How do high-growth startups influence the neighborhoods in which they locate? Using data from the greater London area, we show a positive relationship between entrepreneurship in a neighborhood and the subsequent growth of residential real estate prices. These effects appear concentrated in neighborhoods that had been cheaper prior to the entry of the entrepreneurs. The demographic composition of these communities also changes in a classic pattern of gentrification, with older, less educated residents being replaced by younger, more educated ones.
The World Rust Belts: The Heterogeneous Effects of Deindustrialization on 1993 Cities in Six Industrialized Countries (with E. Moretti and M. Serafinelli).
--> WP version available here!
Media Coverage: NBER Digest, Forbes, VoxEU, Macro Roundup, Les Echos, IZA World of Labor
Abstract: We use a newly-assembled dataset to investigate the employment consequences of deindustrialization for 1,993 cities in in France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Japan and the United States. Unsurprisingly, in all six countries we find a strong negative relationship between a city's share of manufacturing employment in the year of its country’s manufacturing peak and the subsequent change in the city's total employment, reflecting the fact that cities where manufacturing was initially more important experienced a larger negative labor demand shock. But this average effect masks a vast heterogeneity across cities. In a significant number of former manufacturing hubs, total employment fully recovered or even exceeded the initial level, despite the loss of manufacturing jobs. Overall, 34% of former manufacturing hubs in our sample experienced employment growth faster than their country's mean, suggesting that a surprisingly large fraction of cities was able to adapt to the negative employment shock caused by deindustrialization. We then seek to understand the causes of such differences in labor market performance across cities. We find that deindustrialization had profoundly different effects on local employment depending on the initial level of schooling of the local labor force. In particular, using an instrumental variable based on the driving distance to {\it historical} colleges and universities, we find that cities that had a high share of college graduates in the labor force in the year of their country's manufacturing peak experienced faster subsequent total employment growth than cities with a low share of college graduates in the labor force. Our estimates imply that employment in a city at the 75th percentile of its country’s college share distribution grew 7 percentage points faster per decade than a city at the 25th percentile with the same initial share of manufacturing employment. Most of this difference is due to faster employment growth in human capital-intensive services, which more than offset the loss of manufacturing jobs.
Group membership and decision making in the pursuit of innovative ideas: The impact of a scientific approach (with E. Novelli)
Abstract: Group membership–based, for instance, on gender, ethnicity and socio-economic status—tends to influence innovators in their decision on whether and how to pursue an innovative idea’s development –such as a new product, service or business model. Whereas group membership can be a source of superior information, it can also bias the innovators’ decision process. This paper explores whether a theory-based, “scientific”, approach to decision making, which increases the rigor and structure of individuals’ decision-making process, may impact decisions affected by group membership biases and lead to a strategic change of direction. We focus on female and ethnic entrepreneurs developing, respectively, female and ethnicity-targeted ideas as a context in which group membership biases may have affected the decision-making process. Using data from three randomized control trials we show that, after being taught to apply a "scientific" approach to decision making, female or ethnic entrepreneurs with a female or ethnicity-targeted business idea are more likely to change the strategic direction of their idea compared to female or ethnic entrepreneurs targeting the general market. We explore the mechanisms underlying this result.
Technology Adoption and the intergenerational trasmission of entteprenenurship: Evidence from family businesses in rural Ethiopia (with S. Di Falco and V. Pelucco)
This study investigates the influence of newborn gender on technology adoption decisions within family businesses. Drawing on a unique dataset gathered through fieldwork conducted in Ethiopia from 2013 to 2019, we examine how entrepreneurs' propensity to adopt new technologies is affected by the birth of a child. Our findings reveal that entrepreneurs are more inclined to adopt new technologies following the birth of a child. However, this effect is contingent upon the gender of the newborn, manifesting prominently when a son is born rather than a daughter. Specifically, the presence of a son significantly influences the mix of technologies adopted, motivating entrepreneurs to invest in innovations that offer long-term benefits. We speculate that this pattern is explained by the entrepreneur becoming more concerned about the perpetration of the business to the next generation following the arrival of a son due to persistent gendered societal norms about the intergenerational transmission of entrepreneurship.
Managing with autonomy: How to develop intangible assets in Business groups (with N. Dutt and G. Spanos)
Abstract: How does granting autonomy to subsidiaries within corporate groups affect their performance? To measure subsidiary performance, we focus on intangible assets such as intellectual property and trade secrets that contribute to firms’ competitiveness. Autonomy could help subsidiaries build local connections to generate more intangible assets. Or, autonomy, which typically reduces headquarters’ attention, could reduce resource transfer from the headquarters to diminish intangible assets. Using a global sample of business groups from 2011-2015, we show that the effect of autonomy on subsidiary performance depends on temporal distance. Temporally distant subsidiaries have higher intangible assets when given more autonomy. However, when temporally proximate subsidiaries are autonomous, they accumulate fewer intangible assets. Thus, autonomy has distinct implications for the intangible assets of temporally proximate versus distant subsidiaries.
Early stage projects
Gender differences in commuting-to-work before, during and after Covid-19: Evidence from cellular phone data (with V. D’Angelo and M.Mariani)
Entrepreneurial domains, theories and new ideas: Evidence from a field experiment (with G. Chondrakis, C. Frosi, M. Mariani)
Entrepreneurship and medieval guilds (with M. Amore, V. D'Angelo, M. Mariani, M. Percoco)
Main Publications
2024. "Temporal availability and women career progression: Evidence from cross-time-zone acquisitions" (with M.Mariani and Stefano Breschi), Organization Science, forthcoming. Media Coverage: Bocconi Knowledge
2022. "Trained to Lead: Evidence from Industrial Research" (with M. Mariani), Strategic Management Journal, 43(4): 847-871. Media Coverage: Sarfatti 25
2021. "Exposure to OFI and regional labour markets. Evidence from routine and non-routine jobs in Great Britain", (co-authored with S. Iammarino and A. Rodriguez Pose), Journal of Economic Geography, 21(5):783-806. Media Coverage: VoxEU, Financial Times - fDi Intelligence
2020. "Asymmetric spillover effects from MNE investments", (co-authored with A. Ascani), Journal of World Business, 55(6)
2019. "The impact of foreign technological innovation on domestic employment via the industry mix", Research Policy, 48(6): 1523-1533
2018. "Innovation in risky markets: Ownership and location advantages in the UK regions",(co-authored with S. Iammarino), Journal of Economic Geography, 18 (5): 1177-1201.
2018. "The innovative performance of firms in heterogeneous environments: the interplay between external knowledge and internal absorptive capacities", (co-authored with R. Crescenzi), Research Policy, 47(4): 782-795.
2017. “The Impact of the European Cohesion Policy in Urban and Rural Regions: a Discontinuity Approach” (co-authored with M. Percoco), Regional Studies, 51(6): 857-868.
2016. “The greener the better: Environmental friendly technological change and job creation in Italy” (co-authored with G. Marin and C. Miriello), Industrial and Corporate Change, 25 (5): 779-807.
2016. “Evidence on immigrants’ assimilation into recipient labour markets using longitudinal data between 1981 and 2006” (co-authored with S. Lemos), Journal of Economic Geography, 16 (3): 547-583.
2016. “Learning mobility grants and skill (mis)matching in the labour market. The case of the Master and Back Programme” (co-authored with C. Crescenzi and E. Orrù), Papers in Regional Science, 95(4): 671-918.
2015. “Foreign Multinationals and domestic innovation: Intra-industry effects and firm heterogeneity" (co-authored with R. Crescenzi and S. Iammarino), Research Policy, 44: 596–609.
2015. “Does Skilled Migration Foster Innovative Performance: Evidence from British Local Areas”, Papers in Regional Science, 94(4): 773-794.
2013. “Social capital and the innovative performance of Italian provinces“, Environment and Planning A (co-authored with R. Crescenzi and M. Percoco), 45(4): 908–929. Media Coverage: LSE-EUROPP Blog